BEIJING -- They met in a three-star hotel that cannot be named.

The event’s planner was reluctant to give out the names of any participants or their businesses.

And they had to call it a "private gathering" instead of a "convention," "conference" or even "meeting," words that wave Red flags in front of Chinese authorities nervous about any sort of organizing.

Yet the gay movement experienced a minor revolution here last weekend as the owners or operators of some 30 gay and lesbian Chinese websites held their first-ever -- how shall we say? -- get-together. Atop the agenda was discussion of how to use the Internet to promote HIV/AIDS awareness and create a more comfortable environment for "tongzhi," or gay, people.

"We provided a physical space for website owners to meet face to face and get to know one another," said Hong Kong-based gay activist Cheng To, founder of the Chi Heng Foundation that paid for transportation for many attendees. "They have the most potential to reach out to gay people in this country."

Indeed, as powerful as the new media has been for gays in backwater locales in the United States, its promise is unfathomable in a totalitarian society where even such a "private gathering" has participants nervous that the next door knock will be the police.

But regardless of their fears, some attendees traveled for days by train to get to the event and were excited to participate, Cheng said.

"This kind of thing is certainly very significant because people getting together to do that kind of networking is very important," said Sophia Woodman, research director for the New York-based Human Rights in China. "For groups of people who are experiencing violations of their human rights, the Internet is a very important channel to share stories, which is sort of a first step."

An estimated 250 gay-themed websites operate in China, ranging from local chat rooms to one for gay Buddhists. Even the nation’s largest Web portals, Sina.Com and Sohu.Com, offer gay sections for posting messages and chatting. The number of Internet users continues to skyrocket, too, with an estimated 27 million Chinese having access to the Web.

"It’s still a small number compared with the general population, but it is growing very rapidly and it is usually a younger, better-educated, more socially responsible population," Cheng said. "It's a different crowd than those who hang around toilets and parks looking for sex. That's not to put a value judgment on that, but the Internet population is more likely to do something significant about being gay."

Some believe that China's allowance of these sites is tacit acceptance of the community, although it may also be that they exist below the government's censorship radar. Fact is, authorities do still try to block most references to homosexuality in print news media and in most literature. That's why the anonymous author of the nation's most popular gay novel posted it online, finding a ravenous audience of users who print it out and pass it along to offline friends.

Cheng and a co-sponsoring organization that he declined to name spent 50,000 yuan, or $6,000 U.S., to bring the participants to Beijing. Once there, the group listened to an expert explain how to prevent AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases as well as what the legal rights of gays and lesbians are in China.

Homosexual behavior is not illegal by national law, but police do have the power to arrest gays at will under a broad public disturbance statute.

As a result of the meeting, Cheng said, the Chi Heng Foundation will sponsor a contest next year to name the best gay-related news coverage on a site, the best original gay fiction posted online and the best website for promoting AIDS prevention. Prizes may be as high as 5,000 yuan, or $600 U.S., which is many times the monthly salary of most people in the country. The gathering came as other signs emerged of progress for gays. Health Ministry Vice-Minister Yin Dakui urged special attention be paid to improving AIDS education among the homosexual community, the first time an official at that level even acknowledged the community's existence. That came eight months after the Chinese Psychological Association removed homosexuality from their list of psychiatric disorders. And last week’s first national AIDS conference in China features a panel of six experts discussing AIDS in the "men who have sex with men" community and a panel called "About Marginalized Communities" that included chatter about gay issues.

Even harassment from the police seems to be down and, in some cases, authorities are helpful to gay people. When thugs stabbed the owner and broke some furniture at one of Beijing's gay bars in February, the police investigated with surprising intensity. Within a week, the owner of a competing gay bar was charged with hiring the attackers in an effort to scare customers and increase his own business.

Yet these measures of progress aren't necessarily cause for too much enthusiasm, Woodman cautioned.

"The difficulty of organizing remains to the extreme in China," she said. "I don't think we should be optimistic that authorities are going to suddenly allow gay organizations and stuff like that. It's important not to make people think that gay China's problems have gone away just because there's been some progress."

Cheng, who lives in the far more liberated Hong Kong, said he recognizes this. He plans to set up a private e-group for website owners to continue their discussions and hopes to set up another such gathering in another city sometime next year.

"We have now formed a national network of gay websites," he said. "It is a beginning."