October 28–30, 2026 · Vancouver
The program.
Understand AI.
Shape what comes next.
Download the program book (PDF, 2.3 MB)
H.R. MacMillan Space CentreOpening night + two program days
Everything comes with a festival ticket.
60 matching sessions across the three days.
October 28 · Opening night
Wednesday
Amber Case, Brewster Kahle, a live set, and a party
Doors at five. Two talks, a live set, then the party. Meet everybody on night one so the next two days are spent with people you know.
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre Directions ↗
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Registration opens · lobby and exhibits
Registration300 minBadge pickup from noon. The building is open all afternoon, the exhibitor tables are up, and the building fills on its own before anything starts.
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Doors open · opening party · bar
Music + gathering90 minThe party starts at five. Ninety minutes to arrive, get a drink and find your people before anyone says a word from the stage. Opening night includes hosted sushi and dessert, plus alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks.
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Welcome to the territory
Anthony Joseph · Squamish Nation
Anthony Joseph
Ceremony15 minAnthony Joseph of the Squamish Nation opens the festival with a welcome to Squamish territory. The first thing said from this stage, before any of the rest of it.
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Calm Technology in the Age of Loud Machines
Amber Case · Calm Tech Institute
Amber Case
Keynote + Q&A40 minAmber wrote the book on calm technology, and the first talk of the festival is hers: what AI should feel like when it is built for people instead of markets, and what it costs us when it is not. Then ten minutes of questions from the audience.
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AI Builders Fellowship: what they made
Jacob Ortiz · AI Builders Fellowship + Daniel Shavit · Independent
Jacob Ortiz + Daniel Shavit
Fellowship showcase25 minTwo builders from the AI Builders Fellowship, Internet Archive Canada's program with BC + AI, each get ten minutes to show what they built. Jacob Ortiz presents The Archive Argues With Itself: a way to compare Canada's public-health records across decades, open the scanned pages behind an AI answer and see where the archive cannot support one. Daniel Shavit presents What happened on your street? Vancouver through time, from the Archive's records: a film-led journey through Vancouver built from open data, council minutes, archive films and documents. Type an address, explore its history and follow each finding back to the Internet Archive. Then the man who built the Archive takes the stage.
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What a Library Owes the People Who Aren't Born Yet
Brewster Kahle · Internet Archive
Brewster Kahle
Keynote + Q&A45 minBrewster built the Internet Archive. Public memory, the open web, libraries, and what a civic AI owes the people who have not been born yet. Then fifteen minutes of questions from the audience.
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Between the keynote and the live set
Transition5 min - to
Opening-Night Creative AI Live Set
Philippe Pasquier · Metacreation Lab, Simon Fraser University
Philippe Pasquier
Live performance24 minArtists with AI as their instrument: generative visuals, live-coded sound, and a crowd that gets louder as it goes. 24 minutes, then the set hands the night to the party.
October 29 · Day one
Thursday
Making sense of it together
What AI is doing right now to work, health, care, government and the stories we tell, from people who do those jobs for a living. Ten-minute questions after each group of talks.
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre Directions ↗
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Breakfast · registration
Meal60 minHosted breakfast sandwiches, fruit bowls and coffee in the building, with the registration desk open for anyone landing on day one.
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Where we are, and what today is asking
Kris Krüg · BC + AI Ecosystem Association
Kris Krüg
Welcome10 minKris sets the day in ten minutes. Where we are, what Thursday is asking, and how the talks talk to each other.
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Consciousness, Agency, and Building It Anyway
Loki Jorgenson · Circle Innovation
Loki Jorgenson
Talk20 minLoki on what might actually be going on inside these things.
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Learning to live with them
Dr. Angelica Lim · Simon Fraser University · ROSIE Lab
Dr. Angelica Lim
Talk20 minWhat it's actually like to live with these systems, from a researcher who ran that experiment on herself.
Dr. Angelica LimAssociate Professor, School of Computing Science · Simon Fraser University · ROSIE Lab↗ - to
Questions with the speakers
Loki Jorgenson · Circle Innovation + Dr. Angelica Lim · Simon Fraser University · ROSIE Lab
Loki Jorgenson + Dr. Angelica Lim
Audience Q&A10 minThen both of them on stage, comparing notes.
Dr. Angelica LimAssociate Professor, School of Computing Science · Simon Fraser University · ROSIE Lab↗ - to
The Art of Asking Questions: Futureproof Edition
Shane Gibson · Professional Sales Academy
Shane Gibson
Talk20 minShane on asking better questions than the machine.
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The Skill AI Can't Give You (And Keeps Talking You Out Of)
Kerris Hougardy · Ting Internet · Tucows
Kerris Hougardy
Talk20 minKerris on the judgment AI keeps talking you out of, from inside a company rolling it out.
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Questions with the speakers
Shane Gibson · Professional Sales Academy + Kerris Hougardy · Ting Internet · Tucows
Shane Gibson + Kerris Hougardy
Audience Q&A10 minThen Shane and Kerris taking questions.
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Morning break · coffee · conversation
Break30 minCoffee, time with the exhibitor tables, and the first real conversation of the day.
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Who Gets to Tell the Story
Jos Duncan-Asé · Love Now Media
Jos Duncan-Asé
Talk20 minJos on empathy as a media practice and communities that own their own stories.
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Will Wikimedia Survive the Age of AI
Lane Becker · Wikimedia Foundation
Lane Becker
Talk20 minLane comes at the question from Wikipedia, which everything trains on and nobody pays for.
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Questions with the speakers
Jos Duncan-Asé · Love Now Media + Lane Becker · Wikimedia Foundation
Jos Duncan-Asé + Lane Becker
Audience Q&A10 minJos and Lane on stage, taking questions about whose knowledge gets used and who gets a say.
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The Model is the Medium: The Future of Collaborative Intelligence
Toshi Anders Hoo · Former Senior Research Director, Institute for the Future
Toshi Anders Hoo
Talk20 minThe Future of Collaborative Intelligence. What collaborative intelligence between people and AI looks like when it works, from a decade of futures research.
Toshi Anders HooPrincipal, Possibility Spaces · Former Senior Research Director, Institute for the Future↗ - to
Lunch · demo tables in the lounge
Meal60 minHosted lunch in the building, included with your ticket, with demo tables open in the lounge.
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The afternoon reset: Suzy Easton’s solo electronic debut
Suzy Easton · Independent
Suzy Easton
Live performance15 minSuzy Easton makes her solo electronic debut. A Vancouver musician and technologist brings years of playing in bands, recording and building instruments into fifteen minutes of new electronic music after lunch.
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Where the Hype Runs Out in Drug Discovery
Simon Haworth · Intellomx
Simon Haworth
Talk20 minSimon on what AI is actually doing in drug discovery, and where the hype runs out.
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Where care happens
Dean Shev · VHT.ai
Dean Shev
Talk20 minDean builds health AI that has to answer to real patients, HIPAA and PHIPA at the same time.
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Questions with the speakers
Simon Haworth · Intellomx + Dean Shev · VHT.ai
Simon Haworth + Dean Shev
Audience Q&A10 minThe lab and the clinic, back to back, then both of them taking questions.
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Who Owns the Infrastructure Underneath All This
Sev Geraskin · PolarGrid · Economy of Wisdom Foundation
Sev Geraskin
Talk20 minSev is building a real-time AI inference network: what actually survives the trip from demo to production, and what it costs.
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Safety Questions. Science Answers.
Kristen Delphos · UL Research Institutes
Kristen Delphos
Talk20 minKristen on how safety science gets translated for the public without being flattened.
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Questions with the speakers
Sev Geraskin · PolarGrid · Economy of Wisdom Foundation + Kristen Delphos · UL Research Institutes
Sev Geraskin + Kristen Delphos
Audience Q&A10 minSev and Kristen on the systems we build, how we assess their risks and what makes them deserve public trust.
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Afternoon break
Break20 minCoffee before the last of the day.
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BrainRot Revolution
Brett Gaylor · Hololabs
Brett Gaylor
Talk20 minBrett Gaylor brings BrainRot Revolution, his doctoral research on documentary games and critical data literacy. How can playful, participatory work help people question AI and imagine a different internet?
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Where Our Ideas About Machine Intelligence Came From
Stephanie Dick · School of Communication, Simon Fraser University
Stephanie Dick
Talk20 minStephanie on the long history of where our ideas about machine intelligence came from, and who got to decide what counts as knowledge.
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Questions with the speakers
Brett Gaylor · Hololabs + Stephanie Dick · School of Communication, Simon Fraser University
Brett Gaylor + Stephanie Dick
Audience Q&A10 minA filmmaker and a historian, then both on stage for questions.
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What the country decides
Taleeb Noormohamed · Vancouver Granville + Kris Krüg · BC + AI Ecosystem Association
Taleeb Noormohamed + Kris Krüg
Conversation40 minTaleeb sits at the federal AI policy table. Kris sits where it lands. Canada's AI strategy meets the people who have to live in it: one conversation, with questions from the floor.
October 30 · Day two
Friday
What we build next, then the closing party
Breakfast from 8:30 and the opening welcome at 9:20, then Naomi Klein at 9:30 with Catherine Warren. The daily practice, the craft, the community and the long view. Ben Shneiderman closes the talks. The daytime program ends at 5:40; dinner is on your own, and the closing party starts at 8.
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre Directions ↗Closing party at FriendsQuarters · details below.
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Breakfast
Meal50 minHosted breakfast sandwiches, fruit bowls and coffee in the building from 8:30. Day two begins at 9:20.
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Opening welcome
Manuel Axel Strain · xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Simpcw, and Syilx
Manuel Axel Strain
Welcome10 minManuel Axel Strain welcomes everyone to Friday morning at Futureproof Festival.
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A FanTrust Conversation with Naomi Klein
Naomi Klein · UBC Centre for Climate Justice + Catherine Warren · FanTrust
Naomi Klein + Catherine Warren
Conversation60 minJoin us for an intimate conversation with international bestselling author and climate justice advocate Naomi Klein.
FanTrust President Catherine Warren sits down with Naomi to discuss her worldview and new book, End Times Fascism: And the Fight for the Living World, co-written with Astra Taylor. Oligarchs, tech bros, and populist politicians may look like strange bedfellows, but they share an AI ethos and a common toolkit. Together, we’ll unbox it. From harrowing to hopeful, hear how Naomi’s work traces systems of power, who profits from them, and where the rest of us can still push back.
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AI, creativity and cultural policy
Ana Serrano · OCAD University + Prem Gill · Cultural Policy Hub, OCAD University
Ana Serrano + Prem Gill
Conversation20 minAna Serrano and Prem Gill in a fireside conversation about AI and creativity, Public AI Lab, and the Canadian Creative Industries AI Working Group, co-chaired by TIFF and OCAD University and administered by OCAD's Cultural Policy Hub.
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Questions with the speakers
Ana Serrano · OCAD University + Prem Gill · Cultural Policy Hub, OCAD University
Ana Serrano + Prem Gill
Audience Q&A10 minAna and Prem on stage, taking questions from the audience.
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Morning break · coffee · conversation
Break30 minCoffee, a walk to the windows, and the conversation Naomi started.
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Life-Centred AI and Who Owns What We Build
Sara Blenkhorn · Buckminster Fuller Institute
Sara Blenkhorn
Talk20 minSara on life-centred design and who gets to own what we build.
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Resilience at the scale of the whole planet
Andrew Zolli · Planet
Andrew Zolli
Talk20 minAndrew on resilience at the scale of the whole planet, and how communities get through uncertainty.
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Questions with the speakers
Sara Blenkhorn · Buckminster Fuller Institute + Andrew Zolli · Planet
Sara Blenkhorn + Andrew Zolli
Audience Q&A10 minLife-centred design and planetary resilience, then both on stage taking questions.
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Lunch
Meal60 minHosted lunch in the building, included with your ticket.
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Program to be announced
Session20 min - to
Working With AI Without Handing Over Your Judgment
Alexandra Samuel · Independent
Alexandra Samuel
Talk20 minAlexandra on working with AI without handing it your judgment.
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Questions with the speakers
Alexandra Samuel · Independent
Alexandra Samuel
Audience Q&A10 minAlexandra on stage, taking questions from the audience.
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Stop Waiting for Permission
Kevin Friel · BC + AI Film Club
Kevin Friel
Talk20 minKevin co-founded the BC + AI Film Club. What happens when filmmakers stop waiting for permission, make the thing and screen it.
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Blood & Glitter
Mayumi Rollings · Tiny Ghost Studios
Mayumi Rollings
Talk20 minMayumi runs an animation studio that uses AI everywhere and refuses to lose the artists.
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Questions with the speakers
Kevin Friel · BC + AI Film Club + Mayumi Rollings · Tiny Ghost Studios
Kevin Friel + Mayumi Rollings
Audience Q&A10 minKevin and Mayumi take questions on artists, permission and human-led creative work.
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Afternoon break · community photo
Break30 minCoffee, and everybody in one photograph.
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Language Reclamation and Who Owns the Future
Michael Running Wolf · IndigiGenius
Michael Running Wolf
Talk20 minMichael builds machine learning for Indigenous language reclamation, and asks who owns the data, the systems and the future those tools make.
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Peter-Lucas Jones
Te Hiku Media
Talk20 minPeter-Lucas Jones of Te Hiku Media joins the Friday program.
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Questions with the speakers
Michael Running Wolf · IndigiGenius + Peter-Lucas Jones · Te Hiku Media
Michael Running Wolf + Peter-Lucas Jones
Audience Q&A10 minMichael and Peter-Lucas on stage, taking questions from the audience.
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Before the closing keynote
Break10 min - to
There is No "I" in AI
Ben Shneiderman · University of Maryland
Ben Shneiderman
Keynote40 minThe last talk of Futureproof Festival is Ben Shneiderman’s. He wrote the book on human-centered AI, and he closes on designs that hand people more power instead of replacing them. Twenty-five minutes, then fifteen minutes of facilitated questions.
Ben ShneidermanEmeritus Distinguished University Professor of Computer Science · University of Maryland↗ - to
Closing ceremony
Ceremony15 minFifteen minutes to say what we heard, what is still unresolved, and where Futureproof Festival goes from here.
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Dinner on your own
Break140 minThe daytime program is finished. Dinner is on your own; the closing party starts at 8.
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Closing Party
Kris Krüg · BC + AI Ecosystem Association + Charles Bicari · Société des arts technologiques (SAT), Montréal
Kris Krüg + Charles Bicari
Music + gathering120 minMusic, art, and the conversations that are not ready to end. Friday, 8 to 10 PM at FriendsQuarters, Unit 200, 116 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, BC V6B 1G8. Buzz 200. The Friday closing party includes hosted food and alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. It's included with your ticket. Lights out at ten.
Charles BicariSystems Designer and Integrator, Research and Innovation Lab · Société des arts technologiques (SAT), Montréal↗More artists to announce.
Times can still move before the festival.
Plan your visit ↗One ticket. All three days.
Everything on this page comes with a festival ticket.
Opening night includes hosted sushi and dessert, plus alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Thursday and Friday include hosted breakfast sandwiches, fruit bowls and coffee, plus lunch on both days. The Friday closing party includes hosted food and alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Thursday and Friday dinners are on your own before any evening activities.
Opening night, both program days, the performances and the parties. Arriving early or staying the weekend? The certification days around the festival are on the Visit page.
