CoverItLive interesting for live blogging, but Twitter shows its weaknesses

I saw Mathew’s post about CoverItLive, pointing to Rafe Needleman’s more detailed review:

Setting up a CoveritLive account is fast and free, and once you’ve done so you can either jump straight into liveblogging or schedule upcoming events. Liveblog content is all hosted on CoverItLive, and you put it on your blog by pasting in a small snippet of HTML code.

Features you get as publisher, in addition to really easy-to-use IM-like text entry window, include the capability to take comments from readers and post the ones you like in your stream; live polls; and the option to post either pre-canned or new pictures and videos. CoverItLive also provides publishers with statistics on their live viewership, which is very useful.

Once a writer tells the system that the event is over, CoveritLive converts the blog into a static block of text, which users can read in a scrolling window. Pictures and polls that were pop-ups during the live event are inserted at the correct locations in the timeline. Source: Ultimate liveblogging tool: CoverItLive | Webware : Cool Web apps for everyone

Right now I’m sure CoverItLive is the ultimate live blogging tool.  I’ve done a lot of live blogging in the past.  It’s something I’m pretty well known for doing in fact.  So looking at this service, I had a couple of concerns right off the bat and Twitter’s recent problems during MacWorld proved them elegantly.

First off, CoverItLive is based in Toronto, which I think is rather cool, and it is a service for live blogging.  What it does is you have an account (free) that let’s you live blog an event (and with a very rich set of features) and paste a bit of code into a post on your home blog.  As you enter text into the editor (I agree with Rafe, it looks very IM-like):

The Good
The post is updated automatically on your blog, no refreshing required.  That is pretty cool, but there is a downside, the content doesn’t live on your blog or page, it’s on CoverItLive’s servers so no SEO or link bonuses there.  From Rafe’s review it sounds like a final post output to your blog is coming and that would be very welcome.  It also sounds like CoverItLive might be offering their software as a whitelabel install for your own servers (for blog networks like b5 I’d gather) in the future.  All good things.  But …

The Bad and Ugly
The main reason I’d be hesitant to use this service at a conference is one important thing: by and large the WiFi and Net connections at conferences sucks.  Yes, I’ve been at several conferences where the access didn’t suck, but overall it does and especially during times like keynotes.  The CoverItLive service requires a nice, stable, reliable, and active Net connection.  One flub and, well, you’re toast.  I can’t count how many times I’ve seen people lose their posts because they were posting through their web browser and something went wrong and not only didn’t the post go up, but they lost it entirely.  Generally I listen for the anguished screams in the audience…the call of the deep doo-doo bird.  CoverItLive probably wouldn’t be any different.  Though if you’re sending less information at a time to the servers, you have a better chance of it not breaking.

What we’ve learned from Twitter & MacWorld
This week we also had a telling example of why relying on web-based/Net-based services for important tasks like live reports/live blogging is just a dangerous thing.  During Steve Jobs’ keynote at MacWorld, Twitter imploded.  Badly.  So bad that folks like me who use Twitter clients like Twhirl were locked out (5 requests per hour my butt).  Things are back to "normal" now, the Twhirl blog covered the outage and reasons well, however I think we’re all wondering what DEMO and SXSW will bring.

Larry Dignan asks the question on all of our minds: Does Twitter have to be industrial strength?.  Would I pay for better Twitter access? Heck yeah.

Fallout
It seemed that the whole Internet suffered yesterday during and after Jobs’ keynote.  And as Rafe found out, CoverItLive had very poorly timed server troubles, which again goes to my point: When you rely on something in the cloud, you have to plan for it just not being there.  Heck Flickr even had issues yesterday (again bad timing).  Even the big boys have trouble with their toys at times.

Could the future hold something better?
When I live blog I use an offline client.  Always.  If the connection is wonky, and I get posting errors, I just save locally and keep going.  I keep trying to post, but I know that my work is safe and I won’t lose it because the server wonks out.

This is actually where CoverItLive has a real opportunity to shine.  This is what would make it the ultimate live blogging tool for me:

• Light desktop client app with ability to save posts locally before posting
• Sync with the CoverItLive servers (because I like the idea of a post that readers don’t have to refresh)
• When the live blogging is done, post it to my server
• Bonus: Let me run the CoverItLive software on my servers (this isn’t a must have, it would just be really cool).

And when I say light app, I mean no frills.  Not much more than an basic, basic editor.  I’m tempted by devices like the Asus Eee PC because I think it could be a great live blogging/conference machine.  A light app shouldn’t take up a lot of RAM or CPU so it would be battery friendly.

With DEMO08 coming up soon, and I’m all booked to go, I’ll be limbering up my fingers for live blogging and my shutter finger for pics.  Will I give CoverItLive a try?  I don’t know.  It’s tempting, but, wow if the connection dies … I don’t want to be one of the anguished screams.

Update: Keith McSpurren of CoveritLive emailed me about this post to give me a little heck (deserved) about CoveritLive.  First was a reminder that they’ve only been out of the gate for 60 days.  Which means … cut them some slack. Second was the "one flub and you’re toast" bit … I stand corrected. Keith told me their client is okay with a little disconnect and will just try again.  I appreciate it when I get feedback like this.  Keeps me honest, not to mention accurate.