The goal is straightforward: The meeting industry needs to communicate via computer. To that end, APEX — the Convention Industry Council's project to develop industrywide accepted practices — has a technology component: The APEX Technology Advisory Council.

TAC is working on the puzzle of how to send APEX-based documents among organizations that use different operating systems and applications, says E.J. Siwek, CMP, president of FLASHpoint Technologies and chairman of TAC.

So far TAC teams are in place to define data specifications for requests for proposals (led by Bob Bennett, StarCite Inc., and Tony Stanfar, OnVantage); housing and registration (led by Bruce Small, Hyatt Hotels Corp.); and event specifications (led by Alicia Moran, Passkey International Inc.).

To keep industry professionals informed of TAC's progress, a free e-newsletter is being launched this month. To subscribe, send an e-mail with “ADD” in the subject line to ej@flashpointtech.com. The message should include the subscriber's name, title, employer, and mailing address.