The girl in the black Audrey Hepburn dress was crying in the bathroom, mascara running down her cheeks. We found her by chance—a total stranger using the bathroom of a hotel where we were hosting a giant dinner party for our 200 guests. My ZEG co-founders and I, on a quick trip away from our sprawling table, gathered around her, wanting to understand what had happened. Through tears, she told us her boyfriend had just broken up with her and announced he was getting engaged to someone else. On her birthday.

We handed her tissues and then invited her to join our party. Ten minutes later, she was surrounded by journalists, artists, Nobel laureates, filmmakers, and activists, all raising glasses and toasting her birthday as if she were the guest of honor. By the end of the night, she was laughing, swept up in the improbable magic that happens when you throw open the doors and bring strangers together.

As we organize the fifth edition of our storytelling festival, I keep thinking back to that night last summer. Of all the remarkable moments we've witnessed at ZEG, our annual storytelling festival, of all the celebrities and headliners we've hosted, it's that spontaneous encounter that best embodies the spirit of what we're trying to build: a place where boundaries dissolve, where the unexpected is welcome, and where someone who walked in crying can leave feeling part of a community they never knew existed.

How ZEG came to be

I'll be honest: I never thought I believed in ‘events’ as a way to do journalism. When I was reporting from war zones for the BBC, I believed journalism's impact was measured in stories published and scoops landed and in being on the ground. 

Of course, that remains true. But with social media platforms shaping how stories are distributed and consumed, I saw that journalism's survival hinged on our ability to create spaces for meaningful engagement and collective understanding. For our team at Coda, events like ZEG are not a side project—they’re central to how we create meaning and context in a noisy world. They let us go beyond the article, beyond the headline, and to wrestle as a community with the “how” and “why” and, sometimes, to change the story altogether, or at least our understanding of it.

That's the philosophy behind ZEG. But in practice, with colleagues scattered from San Francisco to Tbilisi, London, New York, Milan, and Delhi, the festival is put together in a whirlwind of Slack threads, late-night WhatsApps, and video calls that span time zones. Sometimes I look at the Zoom screen and can't help but chuckle: one of us is in a taxi after covering a protest, another is dialing in from an airport, someone else is squeezing in the call between deadlines or giving a bath to one of the kids. Though we never planned it this way, everyone on the screen is a woman, each of us juggling her own corner of chaos as we plan our biggest event of the year.

A laboratory for journalism

The word “zeg" means "the day after tomorrow” in Georgian. And that encapsulates Coda's mission to look beyond the headlines, connect the dots between crises, identify emerging patterns, and to stay on the story by building sustained narratives in a world that is fragmented, distracted and quick to forget. We know that keeping a critical eye on the present provides insights into the future. It’s why we aim to pioneer new ways to tell stories about the world, to show how local realities are part of wider global conversations that resonate across borders and generations.

ZEG began as a collaboration, a leap of faith between journalists and entrepreneurs in my hometown Tbilisi. We were brought together by the belief that stories can change not just what we know, but how we see and what we do. We wondered, in that first year, if anyone would really fly across the world to Georgia for a festival about telling stories, and how to tell them better. But people did, and—with the exception of the COVID years—they've kept coming ever since.

What started as an experiment has become an international event. In 2025, we’ll host 800 people, including 120 speakers, over three packed days.

Every year, friends ask me: “Who’s your big star at ZEG this time?” I’m never quite sure how to answer. The real magic is in the mix: in the way hundreds of people from all over the world come together, crossing borders both physical and mental, for three days of conversations that bend minds and spark connections that last a lifetime.

If you’re looking for a festival that’s the opposite of formulaic, you’ll find it at ZEG. We don’t have themes; we want space for surprises, to see where the questions we ask take us, and to try to arrive at ideas and perspectives that are fresh.

Beyond the festival

What happens at ZEG doesn't stay at ZEG. We carry on its spirit of inquiry in Coda’s journalism. Our mission is to stay on the story, so that the conversations and connections that begin at the festival invigorate and inform our reporting and coverage long after the festival lights go down.

While we know that for most of you, Tbilisi is a long way to come, we believe there's something essential about having global conversations far from the center. ZEG was born on the periphery, and—as we've seen again and again—it’s from the margins that the most original ideas and most urgent questions often emerge.

These are ideas and questions we want as many people as possible to hear and to interrogate. So we’re also working to make ZEG a year-round series of events both in person and online. This year, we're piloting "mini ZEGs" beyond the shores of Georgia for the first time, with events already being planned in Amsterdam, London, and on the East Coast of the United States.

If you value our work and want to help shape the future of storytelling, become a Coda member today. Membership gives you exclusive access to behind-the-scenes insights, early invitations to events, and the chance to be part of a global community committed to making sense of chaos and finding hope in uncertainty. Your support helps us keep these conversations going, both at ZEG and all year round.

This piece was first published as a members-only newsletter. If you want to go deeper and help us build the future of journalism, join Coda as a member.

The post The Laboratory for the Day After Tomorrow appeared first on Coda Story.

How can artificial intelligence redefine human creativity? What happens when Nobel laureate economists and Ukrainian philosophers debate freedom under fire? Where do we find hope in a world of collapsing systems?

The countdown to ZEG Fest, Coda's flagship annual storytelling festival has begun and we're thrilled to reveal more details about the upcoming festival, returning for its 5th edition on June 13-15, 2025 in Tbilisi, Georgia.

As an organization committed to connecting dots in a fragmented world, Coda Story is proud to co-host this gathering of global thought leaders that embodies our mission of providing context where it's needed most. The festival serves as a physical manifestation of Coda's cross-disciplinary approach to storytelling: bringing together journalists, artists, technologists, and changemakers to reveal the patterns behind today's most pressing challenges.

Many of Coda's investigative stories will jump from page to stage, with our award-winning reporting transformed into immersive exhibits, performances, and interactive experiences.

This year's festival dives deeper than ever into the narratives shaping our collective future, bringing Tbilisi into conversation with global thought leaders across disciplines for three days of boundary-breaking dialogue, creative exploration, and meaningful connection. The audience itself has become increasingly international, with nearly 1,000 participants: including speakers, journalists, artists, and engaged citizens from dozens of countries converging to create a truly global conversation.

Building on Coda's ongoing investigation into AI as a New Religion, visionary thinkers will gather to explore The Future of AI and Creativity, examining how artificial intelligence is reshaping artistic expression and human innovation. Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz will join Ukrainian philosopher Volodymyr Yermolenko for Freedom Under Fire: What Liberty Means in Times of Crisis. Continuing our work on The Playbook, which traces how authoritarian tactics move across borders, the festival will examine how fundamental rights are redefined during turbulent times.

Across three days, the festival will bring together actors, musicians, filmmakers, and cross-disciplinary innovators in conversations that transcend traditional boundaries. From exploring The Future Is DIY: Rethinking Learning in a Disrupted World with education pioneers Marie Lou Papazian and Aaron Rasmussen, to exclusive masterclasses from some of the world's most renowned storytellers: including satirist Armando Iannucci (creator of Veep and The Death of Stalin), legendary photographer Platon, and The New Yorker's Susan Morrison.

The festival puts special focus on Coda's core themes of resistance, democratic resilience, and information integrity. Sessions like Lessons of Resistance and BETRAYAL: A User's Guide bring together key Ukrainian voices including philosopher Volodymyr Yermolenko and creators from the frontlines around the world, examining how civil society confronts authoritarianism and what it truly takes to maintain democratic values under extreme pressure.

The festival confronts our most pressing global challenges through sessions that move beyond headlines. Drawing Ukraine: Art as Witness in War and Sketches from the Front: The Middle East explore how visual storytelling captures truth when words fall short. Acclaimed Chilean architect Alejandro Aravena will share insights in Solving Big Problems: Architect's Lessons, while The Architecture of Power examines how physical spaces embody and reinforce authority structures that shape our daily lives.

At a time of profound disruption to global systems, the festival brings urgent focus to The Future of Aid, gathering some of the most innovative thinkers in the humanitarian field to explore what happens when safety nets collapse. The Museum of Stolen History brings to life stories of colonial theft and cultural repatriation, while Oligarch's Playbook: How the Super-Rich Bend the Rules examines the global mechanisms that enable wealth to reshape democracy itself.

This year's program brings together an unprecedented geographical range of voices – from Bangladesh to South Africa, Uganda to Taiwan, and across Western and Southern Europe to the United States. This global perspective is essential to the festival's mission of creating new centers of understanding that transcend traditional power structures and challenge center-based narratives.

"ZEG is more than a festival – it's a living experiment in the kind of cross-disciplinary collaboration we need to make sense of our fractured world," says Natalia Antelava, CEO and Editor-in-Chief of Coda Media. "By bringing together voices that are rarely in the same room, we create entirely new frameworks for understanding the complex patterns shaping our future. We've designed ZEG as a space where unexpected connections lead to genuine insights."

Elene Jvania, Director of ZEG Fest and Head of Strategic Initiatives at Coda Media, adds: "What makes ZEG special is the chemistry between our speakers and our audience. Unlike traditional festivals where audiences passively consume content, ZEG creates a community where hierarchies dissolve and everyone contributes to the conversation. We're particularly excited about the growing international attendance, which transforms Tbilisi into a global crossroads of ideas for these three days."

The festival brings diverse disciplines together through immersive film screenings, hands-on workshops, expert-led walking tours, and unforgettable performances throughout historic Tbilisi – creating a living laboratory for cross-disciplinary understanding.

Part of Coda's expanding ZEG Network & Production Studio initiative, the festival creates space for the unexpected: insights that challenge assumptions, perspective shifts that inspire action, and connections that transcend borders. In Georgian, "zeg" means "the day after tomorrow": embodying both the festival's and Coda's shared commitment to looking beyond immediate horizons and crafting narratives that matter for our collective future.

While tickets for the festival are available to the public, Coda has launched a new membership program offering exclusive benefits including priority access to all ZEG events and special opportunities to engage with speakers. Coda members at higher tiers receive complimentary festival tickets and invitations to intimate gatherings like the legendary ZEG Supra dinner – a traditional Georgian feast where food, wine, and conversation flow for hours among global thought leaders. Membership supports Coda's cross-border journalism that connects dots others miss while giving participants a voice in shaping what stories get told and how. You can join the membership program here. 

We are enormously grateful to our partners including TBC Concept, UN Women, European Cultural Foundation, Coca-Cola, Setanta Sports and Luminate among others. 

And our biggest gratitude goes to the approximately 800 individuals who attend ZEG and make it the extraordinary, dynamic gathering it has become – creating a unique space where ideas flow freely and unexpected connections flourish.

The post ZEG Storytelling Festival appeared first on Coda Story.