While vacationing in Vegas, I thought a bit about conferences and conventions. Do we really need to attend them anymore?

The answer lies in one’s reason for attending the conference. If you go for the face to face networking, hands-on interaction with the vendors, client meetings, or breakout sessions, then you should probably still go.

However, if you go to find out the latest releases of products, company news, to watch keynotes, etc, then maybe you do not need to go. As most major conferences, there is at least one or two bloggers in attendance and they will post multiple times daily about the happenings and news. Some of the conferences are also making keynotes viewable in real time from the web as well as posting the slides and video from key breakout sessions.

While writing this article, I’m flipping back and forth between my Omea offline newsreader and SharpMT (used to write my posts). Inside Omea, I’ve subscribed to Microsoft Watch. There is a person at the conference blogging about the Microsoft MIX ‘06 conference. If you visit the Mix 06 site, you’ll see some files and conference notes. Even though I was in Vegas, I did not need to go to the conference.

For the best coverage of any event I’ve seen, check out the Engadget coverage of the 2005 Consumer Electronics Show. They built a whole web site around the conference and posted many times a day about announcements, new products, and rumors. I think their coverage was good enough for most people who attended the conference.

Before you book your next flight, search the web to find out if anyone will be blogging about it while there. Maybe you do not need to go.