Futureproof Festival 2026
The most honest AI conversation happening anywhere this year. No hype. No panic. Just real people shaping what comes next.
The festival brings artists, engineers, researchers, founders, educators, skeptics, filmmakers, builders, students, policy people, and community leaders into the same arc: opening night, two program days, film, demos, live performance, and the kind of conversation AI deserves.
This is year one, so we are keeping it simple: one opening night, two program days, one shared arc, and a deliberately small crowd.
The point is not to make another generic AI conference. The point is to set the foundation for a different kind of festival: human, specific, useful, public, and honest enough to hold critique beside curiosity.
Who belongs here
Futureproof is for artists, engineers, educators, ethicists, filmmakers, founders, students, healthcare workers, researchers, investors, policy people, organizers, skeptics, and curious citizens.
You do not need to arrive with a polished opinion about AI.
Come excited. Come skeptical. Come unsettled. Come with the question you keep asking after the demo ends.
Visit the Futureproof website: https://www.futureproof.website/
What the three days look like
Wednesday, Oct 28: Opening night - live performances, talks, immersive art, demos, creative AI culture and the first gathering of the founding Futureproof Festival community.
Thursday, Oct 29: Where we are - Talks, demos, working conversations, and the 2nd Annual BC + AI Film Festival inside the AI festival.
Friday, Oct 30: What we build.
Hackathon Demo Day hosted by Rival Technologies, community voting, the Squatchies, the Year Two reveal, and the AI Film Festival closing party.
Built from the community already showing up
Futureproof is presented by BC + AI and grows out of the rooms already forming around AI in British Columbia: Vancouver AI Meetups, film nights, hackathon stages, ethics conversations, creative experiments, and people who keep showing up before the answers are tidy.
We started this thing in a room full of people trying to figure out what the hell was going on with AI. Artists, coders, founders, teachers, researchers, skeptics, people who were excited, people who were worried, people who were both.
Mostly both.
This did not appear overnight. It is an extension of a thriving creative technology community already gathering, questioning, building, teaching, experimenting, and debating together in public.
Partners already in the room
Presented by BC + AI.
BC + AI membership
BC + AI membership supports the community infrastructure around the festival: in-person events, scholarship seats, documentation, and the work that keeps people connected after the ticket lands.
Active BC + AI members save 25% on Futureproof Festival passes.
Join BC + AI membership: https://bc-ai.ca/membership/
Kris Krüg is the Festival Director and Founder/Executive Director of BC + AI. He runs the Vancouver AI Meetups and has been building Futureproof Festival from the physical community first.