New Zealanders living with HIV are being asked to participate in a new survey which aims to find out whether creating an online community would be beneficial to their lives. The survey - an initiative of Absolutely Positively Positive in Wellington - is now open and will be promoted through the summer until the end of January 2008. Results will be posted on the website in early February 2008. Progress reports will be available just before Christmas and in mid January 2008. The Living With HIV survey explores their present use of the internet and their interest in possible features and services that might be made available through an interactive website dedicated to community building for this diverse range of people. Completion of the survey gives each person an idea of the possibilities that could be realised. People in this virtual community would be able to network with each other and contribute to monthly fora on issues relevant to their lives, hosted by experts. There'll also be opportunities to make friends, volunteer, and socialize locally through bulletin boards advertising events. Newly diagnosed people will find support and mentoring. The website will cater for the different groups within the population (particularly sexual preference) by partitioning interest groups according to the preferences they define in their initial log-in. People living with HIV can make anonymous submissions to complete the survey. Their responses will be aggregated with others so that no individual can be identified. The results will be used to validate the case that there are authentic needs that might be addressed by the development of an interactive website. The findings will be able create a picture of the pattern of responses according to living location (e.g. main centre urban, provincial city, provincial town, rural district etc), how long since diagnosis, sexual preference, age, gender, ethnicity, employment situation, etcetera. The target user population in NZ is an estimated 1800 people living with HIV, and the survey aims to gather online submissions from a minimum of 1000 of these people. Find out more, and take the survey on the link below.