The European Congress of Culture that just ended in Wroclaw, Poland, has been one of the most important European events during this year’s Polish presidency in the EU. Run with impetus, packed with intellectual and artistic personalities, the congress made an attempt to highlight Europe's most important art initiatives. What about this cultural project could be interesting in the context of the NetSquared Community?

Last weekend on June 9-10 in the city of Sarajevo activists and social innovators from the Central and Eastern Europe region and beyond got together to create tech projects driven by social needs. The event was organized by Internews and Transitions Online, and it was based on a Social Innovation Camp model.

Got an idea that uses technology to create social change?

Social Innovation Camp brings together ideas, people, and digital tools to build web-based solutions to social problems — from hacking together software to working out how you'd sustain an idea — all in just 48 hours.

Do you have an idea you want to work on? Or maybe a particular technical solution that could be used for good? Social Innovation Camp Internews in Sarajevo is looking for inspiring ideas and committed people. The call for submissions will be closed Wednesday, May 25, 2011.

"Another World Is Possible" - a slogan of defiance and hope, often on the face of overwhelming odds. At Social Innovation Camp we ask "What does that other world look like, and how can we use social tech to make it happen ?" Maybe you can't make it to the UK for December's camp :) but we could still build a team around your idea if you submit it here. The deadline for ideas is Friday November 7th!
For more background, catch up with the first camp here or watch the Social Innovation Camp idea explained by cardboard cutouts!

Social Innovation Camp - The Movie! You can almost smell the coffee and the over-heating laptops. Starts with credits to Netsquared for inspiration...

More backgound on the Camp at speed-startups for social impact and Live from Social Innovation Camp, the laboratory of buzz.

Social Innovation Camp happened this weekend, and it rocked.

Inspired by a mashup of netsquared, barcamps and seedcamp, it brought together a diverse bunch of hackers & social change activists to cook up prototype projects over the space of a weekend.

And it worked. People brought dedication, passion and skill. They had some fun. They went without much sleep.

Two things stood out for me; first, it proved (again) that the social web is a generative platform for social impact; and second, that it's possible to do events that go beyond talk and lead to real projects and social businesses. But of course, that's the business of netsquared as well :)

Our small organising collective is now recovering, er, aiming to help the projects sustain and grow. There'l be a lot of write-ups, inteviews, videos etc coming out of the camp - more of this later. In the mean time here's a flavour;

Posts by Bobbie Johnson, our embedded Media Guardian blogger:

• Kicking off
• Coding and barcoding
• Future me
• Designer - solve my problem!
• Help me work!
• I’ve got it, you want it
• Breakaway
• Show and tell
• And the winner is…

My late-night half-way analysis; Live from Social Innovation Camp, the laboratory of buzz

A view from Yahoo Developers Network.

All the feeds from our backnetwork (warning: includes tweets!)

Photos on Flickr.

Videoclips and mini-interviews by David Wilcox at Qik

YouTube videos tagged with “sicamp” and “sicamp08“ (mostly by The People Speak team)

"Teamwork, Quick!" by participant Huey Nhan

Enthusiasm from a sponsor (which is nice!) at Accelerating Social Innovation: lessons from SiCamp where Roland Harwood says "On of the big lessons for me of the weekend was how limited organisation can unleash ideas, which is counter-intuitive for many".