Believe it or not, there are people who don't think that the only way for Silicon Valley and Hollywood to get together is through technology.

Jeff Skoll, the billionaire former president of eBay, and actor Robert Redford have teamed up for projects designed around philanthropy and filmmaking. One of the results gets a national unveiling starting Tuesday: ``The New Heroes'' documentary series for PBS stations.

The series, which focuses on a globe-spanning group of ``social entrepreneurs'' who want to use business strategies to finance non-profit goals, epitomizes a longtime Redford ideal of using film on behalf of cultural and humanitarian causes.

And in Skoll, who founded the Skoll Foundation and has overseen its growth to more than $500 million in assets, Redford has found the kind of tech-wealthy social activist who is giving life to initiatives that previously couldn't get off the ground. Redford, 67, is the host and one of the narrators of ``The New Heroes.''

``When you see examples of individuals,'' Redford says, ``particularly working against impossible odds in extremely impoverished situations, doing something out of their own conviction and courage, that is making a difference no matter how big, that can be inspirational to others to say, `Oh, I see, one person doing this can.' ''

Among the people featured in ``The New Heroes'' is Kailash Satyarthi, who infiltrates slave-labor camps in India, trying to avoid detection from the thugs who run them and bring families back to a protected village where the children are given education and job training.

Skoll, whose foundation (http://www.skollfoundation.org/) invested $1.7 million in the development and production of the four-hour series, says he's already hearing anecdotes about the kind of grass-roots impact that he and Redford are trying to generate.

``A friend of mine,'' says Skoll, 40, ``who didn't know much about the show except that we were doing it, saw it independently at the Indian Film Festival in Los Angeles. . . . She then wrote me an e-mail saying she had seen some of the segments from the show and it so moved her that she was going to quit her job to try and find something more meaningful to do.''

And, Skoll says, she followed through.

Skoll and Redford spent much of Monday in San Jose promoting ``The New Heroes,'' finishing off with an evening screening and discussion at the San Jose Repertory Theatre. They say their collaboration is evolving in a variety of ways and includes Skoll's support for Redford's Sundance Institute, best known for the Sundance Film Festival.

``We have a partnership,'' Skoll says, ``creating a company around documentaries, which we haven't really talked about much in public but which we think is going to be an important new voice in bringing emerging documentary filmmakers into the public eye.''

Redford said one of the key objectives will be the theatrical release of documentaries, not just distribution through broadcast or cable TV.

Long frustrated by an inability to interest media corporations in projects that weren't considered commercial enough to satisfy ``the bottom line,'' Redford says he wants to open avenues for filmmaking to be ``more of a cultural exchange'' instead of ``just straight entertainment.''

On a slightly different tack, Skoll last year founded Participant Productions, a company largely dedicated to creating major motion pictures that would promote social change.

``We now have eight movies in various stages of production, four of which will be out this year,'' Skoll says.

Two of the highest-profile films, made in conjunction with Warner Bros., are in postproduction: ``Syriana,'' a political thriller about the energy industry, starring George Clooney and Matt Damon, and an untitled drama about a single mother, played by Charlize Theron, who fights against the mistreatment of employees by a mining company.

Skoll is hoping that ``Syriana'' will make its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September.

Redford says his association with Skoll on the potential of social entrepreneurship is ``a natural hookup,'' and Skoll says, ``The point is we share a commitment to the power of film to make a difference.''

And in their expanding partnership, that's the bottom line.

`The New Heroes' on PBS

The documentary series on ``social entrepreneurs,'' with Robert Redford as host, will make its debut on PBS stations starting Tuesday.

The first and second hours of the four-hour series run on KQED (Ch. 9) Tuesday at 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., respectively (http://www.kqed.org/). The second two hours are scheduled for 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. July 5. KQED info comfirmed by Nooch on KQED web schedules KTEH (Ch. 54) will run the series in four parts on July 7, 14, 21 and 28, starting at 8 p.m. each time. KTEH info confirmed by phone with head of programming - not in any available listings

The Skoll Foundation of Palo Alto, which initiated the series, is offering a ``house party tool kit'' for group viewings. Go to the Web site --www.skollfoundation.org -- and click on ``New Heroes House Parties.''