Why Small Files?

Why small files? Because online video is killing the planet: video on demand, video on the ’Tube, videos on social media, video calling, video conferences, etc., all streaming to our devices. The data centers, networks, and devices that store, transmit, and play video contribute a whopping 4% of greenhouse gas emissions – double that of the airline industry. That footprint is rising faster than other sectors, especially with with the cutting of environmental safeguards across the globe. Here's the research.

Streaming comprises a significant proportion of the carbon footprint of the networked infrastructures that store, transmit, and display all our video-based media and other large files, cryptocurrency, artificial-intelligence applications, and Internet of Things apps. Recently AI data centers have drawn attention to the massive energy demand of networked technologies. All these uses require huge amounts of electricity, and about 79% of global electricity comes from fossil fuels: hence the large carbon footprint.

Engineers say it’s more efficient to fill those networks to capacity, but our goal is to reduce demand for high-resolution video so we don’t need to expand data centers and networks and fancy 4K and 8K devices. (We know, good luck, right?)

We offer a solution to the rising carbon footprint of streaming through the creation and dissemination of Small-File Ecomedia, low-bandwidth movies of an average of 1.44 megabytes per minute—a tiny fraction of standard video, which is between 60 and 350 megabytes per minute. Small-file movies travel on a 2G network!

Audiences enjoy small-file movies during our annual online festival and, since 2022, live at Vancouver’s legendary The Cinematheque.

What is a Small File?

The Small File Media Festival features Small-File Ecomedia, movies that travel at a bitrate of 1.44MB per minute, showing that great cinema doesn’t have to mean great big files. This lo-fi intervention draws from both do it yourself (DIY) movements and computer-based artistic practices. Practitioners can utilize free, cross-platform apps including Handbrake, FFmpeg, AnyVideo Converter and AVIDMUX to compress moving-image files to a fraction of their original size. Some artists use these aesthetic tools to manipulate the granular materiality of digital media objects.

Small-File Ecomedia offers a solution to the rising carbon footprint of streaming through the creation and dissemination of Small-File Ecomedia, low-bandwidth movies of an average of megabyte per minute—a tiny fraction of high-definition video, which is between 60 and 350 megabytes per minute which allows them to be streamed with no damage to the planet. Audiences enjoy small-file movies during our annual online festival and in addition, since 2022, live in the theatre.

Partners

The Small File Media Festival continues our partnership with our future-forward friends at VIVO Media Arts, the Cairo Video Festival, The Hmm Amsterdam, and Beta Festival. We’re most grateful to the Canada Council for the Arts, BC Arts Council, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and SFU School for the Contemporary Arts.

About the Festival

The Small File Media Festival features Small-File Ecomedia, movies compressed at a rate of 1.44 MB per minute each, showing that great cinema doesn’t have to mean great big files. This lo-fi intervention draws from both DIY movements and computer-based artistic practices.

The Small File Media Festival was founded in 2020 to raise awareness of the high carbon footprint of streaming media and to promote the use of Small File Eco-Media. The festival proposes alternative solutions for media practice, as well as modes of thinking otherwise in media theory, which converged in an online festival of sustainable experimental media organized annually.

Media artists from all over the world, both distinguished and emerging, respond to our small-file call for movies that are PUNK/CHIC—forceful and elegant, streamlined, and stealthy, uncompromising in vision, edgy in message. We've screened over 400 submissions from more than 24 countries, with each artist receiving a CARFAC-rate screening fee.

Our festival challenges media makers to intervene in the 4K dystopia of bandwidth imperialism by creating original small-file movies of any length, proving once again that small files are the sustainable cinematic avant-garde. Watching small-file media together on a big screen brings the democratic potential of cinema into the digital age by showcasing artworks made with eco-friendly practices, affordable equipment, and minimal processing time.

Small File Team

The Small File team is a network of academics, researchers, curators, artists, and activists, dedicated to promoting the use of Small-File Ecomedia and the research behind it. Starting from an online festival in 2020, Small Files have found their ways into festivals, workshops, installations and panels including in Canada, Egypt, Mexico, Iran and Bangladesh. Our network is steadily growing, and you can meet the team here and find out how you can host your own Small File event.

Our associated research team confirmed these figures in a 2020 SSHRC-funded survey of the ICT engineering literature, which generated a 65-page survey document and numerous academic articles, news articles, interviews, and continuing research.) About a third of that is the infrastructural share that supports streaming media. The whole category is busting out of control as people worldwide, intoxicated by corporate media’s siren songs, stream all kinds of media in high definition, video chat, video conference, and play high-resolution online games, not to mention invest in crypto and get hooked on artificial intelligence apps.

Acknowledgements

The Small File Media Festival grows out of the School for the Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada, on unceded territory of the –Sḵwxw̱ ú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō and Səlío lwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) nations. We are grateful for support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Contact

Questions? Comments? Get a hold of the Small File Team at [email protected]

Dr. Laura U. Marks can be reached at [email protected]