The recent XVth International AIDS Conference in Bangkok represented a remarkable aggregation of the best and most current information on AIDS: keynote presentations, nearly 200 sessions, 100 satellite sessions, hundreds of exhibitions, 2000 posters, community activities, workshops, off-site events, and much more.

Some useful information from the conference has made it online. The IAS (with Medscape) has posted a search tool for abstracts, there are two sources of news (newsletter and Kaiser reports), and there are summary rapporteur's reports (that are quite nicely presented). (I'm sorry to not link to these resources: the IAS throws up both technical and legal barriers to linking for some unexplainable reason.)

Nearly all of the conference information, however, is not online and apparently never will be. This is a great loss. The conference represents tens of millions of dollars of cost to hold, the IAS has most of these materials already in electronic form, and much of it would be easy to post. Posting materials involves getting permissions (which most will readily give) and covering costs (which should be easy) and the incentive to better serve conference participants and a larger global community (which apparently isn't there at this stage).

My recommendations to the IAS for 2006 would be to do two things: first plan for the first "electronic conference" that seeks to put as much as possible online (through the main conference site). Second I'd choose a vendor to build a parallel site in which participants and exhibitors can post and discuss conference issues as they see fit. This parallel space could potentially grow to be as important as the conference itself with proper planning, some resources, and necessary dedication.