Check out this cool 10-minute documentary on Social Innovation Camp Caucasus produced by the Open Society Georgia Foundation, one of the main sponsors of the 9-10 April event in Tbilisi.

The camp, the first of its kind in the region, brought together young activists, bloggers, developers, designers, and other creative/engaged types, mainly from Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, to speed-develop functional, sustainable online tools to tackle social issues ranging from environmental degredation to sexual health. (TOL was also a sponsor of the camp, and I served as a judge on the panel that chose the winning project.)

Welcome to TOL’s New Media blog, the place to track events and developments in IT, social media and their intersection with politics, business and culture in the post-communist world. Join us here for a robust dialogue and a fresh take on cool sites, new apps, usage trends, gains and losses on the electronic-freedom front, and other media news.

We’re kicking off with a stellar lineup of contributors from around TOL’s coverage area:

Vojcech Sakłovic is a blogger, translator and online media expert who splits his time between Minsk and London (where he is studying for his MA in media). He is a Belarus contributor to Global Voices Online and does new-media training for journalists in Belarus, the Caucasus and Central Asia.

Yelena Jetpyspayeva is an Almaty-based journalist, consultant and BarCamp enthusiast/organizer. She serves as Russian-language managing editor for the TOL partner project Neweurasia.net, and her own blog, Me. About., covers new-media developments in Central Asia and beyond.

Emin Huseynzade is TOL’s Caucasus project manager. He holds master’s degrees from the Azerbaijan State Economic University and the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs. Emin is a former producer for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and also contributes to TOL’s Steady State Caucasus blog.

Igor Kandyba is a Belarusian blogger, podcaster and Drupal developer from Belarus. He is fascinated with information design, the semantic Web, and using new media tools for social change.

We’ll be adding to the roster as time goes on, and we welcome new voices. If you’re interested in joining in, see the Blog for Us page for details.