The Small File Media Festival is back with our crazy third iteration, this year both online and in person!

Join us from August 9-14 at the SFU School for the Contemporary Arts in Vancouver, BC, on the unceded traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Watuth nations, for five days of screenings, workshops and musical performances celebrating earth-cooling, PUNK/CHIC small-file eco media. We’re going to immerse in tiny movies on the huge screen! We are overjoyed to host the first ever, high-energy Small File Music Showcase with high N-R-G electronic acts Devours, HiNi and the JPEG 2000 Karaoke Explosion on August 12. On August 14 at the festive closing ceremony we’ll hold the world’s first NSFT* auction! All proceeds will go to the artist, and the owner will receive an ultra-tiny certificate of authentication. With lo-fi augmented reality, friendly wi-fi robots, and the incomparably charming Small File Team in attendance, this year’s festivities model fun and planet-friendly appropriate technologies.

Friends around the world can partake in small-file fun as in previous years! You can preview NSFT art August 9-14, join the auction August 14, and enjoy the full festival online, August 16-21.

Why small files? Because streaming media is overheating the planet. Networks, data centers, and devices contribute a whopping 4% of greenhouse gas emissions. 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.

Up to now we have been low-key, we have been playing it nice. But the world is broken. This time we are demanding—stop fossil fuels dependence bringing war and destruction worldwide!** We are demanding—unleash creative r/evolution! We are demanding—destroy the large-file clichés of thinking that prevent us from imaging a world otherwise!

International media artists both distinguished and emerging responded to this year’s small-file call for movies that are PUNK/CHIC—forceful and elegant, streamlined and stealthy, uncompromising in vision, edgy in message. We received over 100 submissions from 18 countries in the categories NSFT art (gleefully lampoon media reliant on fume-belching blockchain); Portals (seed-crystals for rituals and coalitions); the Small-file song contest; and our mind-blowing Other category, in three file sizes! Molecules, infra-small loops and the like, under 1MB; Ripples, works up to 5 MB; and Trouble, bingeworthy series up to 22 MB. As ever, the Small File Team is lovingly curating the accepted works into satisfying thematic programs.

The Small File Media Festival team is Sophia Biedka, Kim Cleroux, Mena El Shazly, Joey Malbon, Laura Marks, Radek Przedpełski, and Faune Ybarra