CoveritLive is a web-based service for blog

Blog

A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...

ging events in real time, or 'liveblogging

Liveblogging

A liveblog is a blog post which is intended to provide a rolling textual coverage of an ongoing event, similar to Live television or live radio. Liveblogging has increased in usage by news organizations and blogging establishments since the mid-2000s, when they were initially used to broadcast...

'. Developed by a Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

-based company of the same name, established in 2007, the application is used extensively by individuals and companies - journalist

Journalist

A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...

s and media

News media

The news media are those elements of the mass media that focus on delivering news to the general public or a target public.These include print media , broadcast news , and more recently the Internet .-Etymology:A medium is a carrier of something...

 in particular - to provide live commentary on political and industry events, speeches, sport, etc. It was founded by Keith McSpurren who also co-founded Salesdriver.com with Joel Silver.

Company history

In January 2009, CoveritLive secured $1 million in a first round of funding (from seed investor Flagstone Capital and private investor Paul Kedrosky). In August 2009, California-based Demand Media

Demand Media

Demand Media, Inc. is an online media company and content farm that operates online brands such as eHow, and Cracked, and is known for creating online content through its Demand Media Studios division based on a combination of measured consumer demand and predicted ROI...

 made a strategic investment and acquired a minority stake in CoveritLive; Demand Media said it would offer services to customers of its Pluck

Pluck (company)

Pluck was an American Internet company based in Austin, Texas, that ran a website since 2005 that offered an RSS reader. The company was acquired by Demand Media on March 3, 2008 for US$75 million in cash....

 enterprise social media

Social media

The term Social Media refers to the use of web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into an interactive dialogue. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as "a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0,...

 platform, which include Sky News

Sky News

Sky News is a 24-hour British and international satellite television news broadcaster with an emphasis on UK and international news stories.The service places emphasis on rolling news, including the latest breaking news. Sky News also hosts localised versions of the channel in Australia and in New...

, NPR

NPR

NPR, formerly National Public Radio, is a privately and publicly funded non-profit membership media organization that serves as a national syndicator to a network of 900 public radio stations in the United States. NPR was created in 1970, following congressional passage of the Public Broadcasting...

, USA Today

USA Today

USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...

 and the NFL.

CoveritLive has been used to cover events including the May 2010 UK General Election (The Scotsman http://www.scotsman.com/CustomPages/CustomPage.aspx?PageID=82164), the NFL Draft (2010 http://www.coveritlive.com/mobile.php/option=com_mobile/task=viewaltcast/altcast_code=29340e30f8), American Idol

American Idol

American Idol, titled American Idol: The Search for a Superstar for the first season, is a reality television singing competition created by Simon Fuller and produced by FremantleMedia North America and 19 Entertainment...

, the 2010 Tour de France

2010 Tour de France

The 2010 Tour de France was the 97th edition of the Tour de France cycle race, one of cycling's Grand Tours. It started on with an 8.9 km prologue time trial in Rotterdam, the first start in the Netherlands since 1996...

 (Velo News http://velonews.competitor.com/live?altcast_code=a6694af4ee) and the 2010 FIFA World Cup

2010 FIFA World Cup

The 2010 FIFA World Cup was the 19th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national association football teams. It took place in South Africa from 11 June to 11 July 2010...

 (during which it claimed 146 million page views in 30 days). However, as with many social media platforms, CoveritLive provides an outlet for numerous individuals and small organizations to share a wide variety of real, virtual

Virtual event

A Virtual Event is a gathering of people sharing a common virtual environment on the web, rather than meeting in a physical location. Virtual events are highly interactive, looking and feeling a lot like their physical counterparts....

 and hybrid events.

The service crashed temporarily during 27 January 2010 due to a massive surge of interest in journalists' feeds using CoveritLive to report Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs

Steven Paul Jobs was an American businessman and inventor widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution. He was co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Inc...

' keynote at Apple's launch of its iPad

IPad

The iPad is a line of tablet computers designed, developed and marketed by Apple Inc., primarily as a platform for audio-visual media including books, periodicals, movies, music, games, and web content. The iPad was introduced on January 27, 2010 by Apple's then-CEO Steve Jobs. Its size and...

 device. Online publications using CoveritLive for this event included MacWorldhttp://www.macworld.com/ and MacNNhttp://www.macnn.com/. CoveritLive CEO Keith McSpurren said in February 2010 that CoveritLive is responsible for more than 82 million page views a month.

In February 2011, CoveritLive was acquired by Demand Media for an undisclosed sum.

Service features

The browser-based application allows users to post and update content, insert images or video, create polls, provide feedback, and manage Q&A sessions. CoveritLive also archives each session and provides analytics

Analytics

Analytics is the application of computer technology, operational research, and statistics to solve problems in business and industry. Analytics is carried out within an information system: while, in the past, statistics and mathematics could be studied without computers and software, analytics has...

. New posts and updates are refreshed automatically, meaning that readers don't have to manually refresh their browser.