There are more and more conferences. LIFT is just one more example of how much people want to meet, not only on Facebook or Skype, but also in the “flesh and blood” world to exchange knowledge and experiences and generate ideas and dynamics.

The problem is that there are too many. It is nearly impossible for any active professional to attend all conferences that take place because of the most common two problems:
1. Time (the time spent in the conference is time not worked)
2. Money (conference fees, travel expenses plus loss of income)
Also, international conferences have a number of negative side-effects, the number one being probably the CO2 produced by the planes to fly people in. Flying another place for a conference gets you to meet many like-minded people, but you might not see them often after the conference is over, because the likelihood of them living close to your place is slim.

The International AIDS Conference had another problem: size. As the largest international medical conference worldwide (20,000+ attendees, 2,000+ staff and 2,000+ volunteers (!)) it is extremely difficult to find venues to accommodate everyone (if you don’t want to be in North America every time…). In addition, many potential delegates from developing countries find the travel costs to attend these events too expensive.

The solution we put in place for the XVII International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2008) – held in August 2008 in Mexico City - was to extend the reach of the conference to those who are not able to attend the conference, thanks to places where many of the conference sessions were projected, followed locally by moderated sessions discussing the local impact of what has been presented remotely.

The gain in time and money for participants is evident. Moreover, more people from affected regions will have access to the information and networking opportunities, which will in turn stimulate the development of evidence-based action on a local level. Local media was also much keener to report on a “local” event than on something happening on another continent.

There were three main types of hubs:

* Official Hubs, organized by the conference organizers (only one of this kind, in Durban, South Africa)
* Partner Hubs, organized with the World Bank
* Independent Hubs, more than 120 were organized by any global/local individual/organization/institution/NGO without the help of the organizers. This is a web 2.0 approach to conferencing.

All hubs were advertised on the conference web site to maximize participation and in principle, open to anybody.

The purpose of this workshop is to present the results we obtained at AIDS 2008 and brainstorm on the future of hubs, in particular
* • Applicability (under which conditions can Hubs be used? – e.g. would it work for LIFT?)
* • Promotion and Incentives
* • Funding
* • Technology
* • Organization
* • 1-way, 2-ways or n-ways communications?
* • All the rest…

Conference Hubs are a great way to make conferences cheaper, more effective, more widely available and cleaner!

Project home page: http://www.aids2008.org/hubs