Great Tool for Live Blogging: Cover It Live

Live blogging is one way to cover an event in real-time. The problem is, you usually have to keep updating your post and refreshing the page to see your new content. Or you use the comments section of your post and refresh to see new comments. That's time consuming and frustrating for you and your readers. I am not a fan of inefficiency. There has to be a better way, right? Well, there is. Cover It Live is free, easy-to-use software that plugs itself in wherever you need it. If you can embed a YouTube video in a blog post, you can embed Cover It Live.

Why I think Cover It Live is great:

• You aren't posting and constantly refreshing your screen to see new content.
• Content/comments are live and come up in real-time as each reader posts.
• You can integrate related video, images, audio.
• You can add a Twitter feed.
• Cover It Live offers comment moderation.
• You can embed your Cover It Live session just about anywhere.
• Your readers don't need to install anything on their own computers; they can just interact on your web site!
• If your readers can't make the live blog, they can always watch it later. The session stays embedded in your post and can be re-played at the click of a button.

Cover It Live provides several instructional videos to show you how

• your readers will see your live blog
• to use the software
• to embed the software in a blog post or web site

Polly at PAFA.net reviewed Cover It LIve and imbedded her test and some of the features she found.

I used Cover It Live here at BlogHer.com during the RNC. I found it easy to set up and use. However, I suggest that you do some trial runs before your actual live blog just to practice with the software and become familiar with your options. You can embed relevant video or other media into your live blog (you may want to queue these up so they are ready to insert as you need them and aren't looking for them at the last minute).

Stephanie Romanski, Web editor of The Grand Island Independent used Cover It Live when the newspaper she works for did a site redesign:

I decided to open up a liveblog/chat and talk to the readers as they checked out the new site.

They gave us invaluable feedback which allowed us to find bugs quickly and fix them, streamline our navigation for readers who were having difficulty and most of all it gave us *and the readers* immediacy. They loved it, and so did we.

You can live blog from you computer, of course, but did you know Cover It Live also works with your mobile device? Use your iPhone, Blackberry, or any smartphone with Cover It Live.

If you're planning a live blog session, I highly recommend using Cover It Live as a resource.

Melanie Nelson writes tips and instruction for beginning bloggers at Blogging Basics 101.