New in the Moldovasphere

Moldovaphiles should check out this new website, Moldovarious, which has been set up by a couple of Austrians. Curiously, the guys behind another interesting project related to Moldova (well, related to the PMR) profiled here are also Austrian. Here's a great graphic from Moldovarious:


For some reason, I was reminded of Alexander Culiuc's posts about branding Moldova as a tourist and investment destination and developing a "brand" for the Moldovan blogosphere.

And, via barabanch, I learned of another newly launched project, this one initiated by Moldovans and called ThinkMoldova (also available in English), which also has a snappy logo:


One of the people involved in the project is Barabanov's wife and fellow New Times journalist Natalia Morari. The front page of the website suggests a level of thoughtfulness (or perhaps just contrariness) which could mean this website will be more interesting than other attempts to get Moldovan youth to pay attention to politics (not that this is necessarily their primary motivation, but elections are coming up next spring...):

ThinkMoldova — Change Moldova!

If you think that the only chance to make your dreams come true is outside of Moldova, you may be right.

If you think that you just need a job outside of the country to live decently and have a family, you may be right.

If you are a girl you may think that you need a wealthy man to afford the things you always wanted, you may be right.

If you consider yourself unlucky because your parents could not give you enough money to buy the car you always wanted to drive, you may be right.

If you think that you have no future in Moldova, you might be right.

If you feel that things could be different for you here, we don’t know if you are right or wrong, but you should Join Us!

We welcome people with different perspectives.

The project's mission statement looks even more promising:

ThinkMoldova is a platform dedicated to young people. It is the place where young people directly participate in proposing new ideas and take part in the decisions important for their own future and their country.

ThinkMoldova is about giving initiative to young people and fights to offer them the possibility to affirm themselves outside of the conventional, hierarchical and parochial institutions prevalent in Moldova’s society and political system.

ThinkMoldova is an independent platform without any political affiliations, where young people are encouraged to express their views freely and all democratic and tolerant perspectives are taken into consideration and encouraged.

ThinkMoldova is a self-financed organization which is open to contributions by individuals, organizations or companies.

Our Mission

To contribute to the development of an active generation and to the general development of Moldova and its citizens.

To create an active and productive dialogue between decision makers, experts and young people.

There isn't much content on the site yet, other than some links to online coverage of their recent event with Iurie Rosca, but it seems they're just getting up and running. Hopefully this project lives up to its apparent promise.