Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPhoto: Michelle Diamond.
Listen
Hear the room think out loud.
Take in ideas, hard questions, and perspectives that do not arrive pre-agreed.
Vancouver · Oct 28-30, 2026
The most honest AI conversation happening this year.
Once a year, we make room for three days of candid conversation, creative work, and people comparing what AI is really doing.
Futureproof Festival grew out of a monthly Vancouver AI meetup that kept outgrowing its room. This October it comes home to the Space Centre for opening night and two program days. Come listen closely, make something, and experience it together.
- Call for Talks
- July 31, 2026 priority review
- Earlyworm
- CA$650 · August 15, 2026
- Festival
- October 28-30, 2026
- Venue partner
- H.R. MacMillan Space Centre
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPhoto: Michelle Diamond
Call for Talks
What's a talk you want to hear that nobody's giving yet?
Send the thing you want to give, or the one you wish someone else would. Rough ideas, first drafts, and unusual formats are welcome.
Priority review deadline: July 31, 2026
Pitch your ideaEarlyworm Festival Pass
CA$650
Three festival days. Lock the early price before the countdown runs out.
Opening night plus two program days at H.R. MacMillan Space Centre, October 28-30, 2026.
Get the Earlyworm passEarlyworm pricing ends
August 15, 2026
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The festival
A festival, not a pile of sessions.
Opening night and two program days belong to one festival, so ideas, questions, creative work, and the people carrying them can meet in the same place.
The manifesto
What should the future feel like?
Fifteen hand-painted posters carry the arguments this festival keeps coming back to. No committee slogans. Real questions, painted large.
The Future Is a Cultural Question.
Festival poster 01 of 15 · Futureproof Festival art layer
Fifteen hand-painted answers to one question: what should the future feel like? Click a poster, or use the arrow keys.
Three ways to take part
Listen. Make. Experience.
Futureproof Festival is built for attention, participation, and the kind of discovery that needs other people in the room.
Authentic photograph, not AI-generated
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPhoto: Michelle Diamond - Vancouver AI Meetup
Make
Put ideas to work.
Build, test, compare notes, and learn what changes when people get their hands on the technology.
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPhoto: Michelle Diamond.
Experience
Feel what changes in person.
Share creative work, close attention, and the energy that only happens when people gather in a real room.
Built From Community
The room is already real.
Futureproof Festival grew out of an existing community already gathering, questioning, building, teaching, experimenting, and debating together in public. This festival is an extension of that foundation.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedThe room is already real. A Space Centre audience paying attention, no rented buzz.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPeople still talk to each other here. Useful, weirdly radical, deeply Vancouver.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedThe audience gets a microphone. The festival is not built for passive nodding.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedFilm Club energy: screen glow, sharp questions, art in the room.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedThe human part stays on screen. That is the work.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedMAC brings the weird questions with enough rigor to hold the room.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedThe Space Centre looks better when the lights are on and people are inside.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
From the community
A community with a pulse, a phone in the air, and very little patience for beige.
Photo: BC + AI community archive.
From the community
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedPacked, warm, paying attention. The opposite of a hype funnel.
Photo: Michelle Diamond.
Festival home
The Space Centre is already alive.
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre is Futureproof Festival's home and venue partner, grounded in Vanier Park and already familiar to the Vancouver AI community.
Authentic photograph, not AI-generatedAuthentic photograph, not AI-generatedLatest from the festival
News from the room.
Speaker announcements, program updates, and festival milestones, posted as they happen.
Find your way in
Four reasons to be in the room.
You do not need the same background, job title, or opinion as everyone else. Bring the part of this conversation that is real for you.
Curious
For people trying to get an honest read on AI.
Bring your questions, your doubts, and the parts that still do not fit into a neat answer.
Explore the festival →Creative
For people making culture in a changing medium.
Artists, filmmakers, designers, and storytellers belong in the centre of the conversation.
See the festival overview →Builder
For people who learn by making.
Bring a working prototype, a practical question, or something you want thoughtful people to try.
Bring a demo →Community
For people helping others make sense of change.
Teachers, organizers, researchers, and public-interest practitioners can compare what is working in the real world.
Meet the community →Get involved
Help shape the first Futureproof Festival.
Some people want to attend, some want to sponsor, and some want to bring something tangible into the room. Choose the path that fits and connect with us directly.
Tickets
Registration is open.
Choose the pass that fits and register directly through the official Futureproof Festival page on Luma.
Sponsors
Partner with the festival.
Talk with us about practical ways your organization can support the festival and the community behind it.
Exhibit
Bring something people can experience.
Share what you want to show, demonstrate, or invite people to try, and we will continue the conversation.
Presented by BC + AI
Built with people who already show up.
BC + AI is the presenting ecosystem. These confirmed partners bring venue, research, creative community, data practice, and actual humans who have been doing the work before it looked shiny.
Earlyworm registration