He was watching a game with his wife last year while communicating with a friend from Switzerland over Facebook and receiving text messages from his father when he came up with an idea.
“I was like ‘God, if I could just have this in my hand, where I was watching the game and do all this and see what people were talking about on Twitter … it would make the game even more fun because now I’m connected with all the people I care about being connected with while I’m in the moment,'” he said.
That was the beginning of SportStream, a free application for the iPad that was just approved by Apple and went live on June 14.
The new program offers curated Twitter feeds for major games that focus on posts from the most popular users based on an evolving credibility database. Fans also can check into games on Facebook and invite friends, as well as talk trash with others in another area of the app.
“The concept is to enhance the live sports viewing experience rather than replace it,” Hunsinger said. “Sports are inherently social. We want to connect friends, fans, and foes, if you will, around the game action and enhance the viewing experience by allowing people to connect on whatever and socialize and consume the game conversation at whatever level that they’re comfortable with.”
Hunsinger received a big lift from Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen right after he came up with the idea for SportService. The billionaire owner of the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers and NFL’s Seattle Seahawks funded the new company with a $3.5 million investment through his firm, Vulcan Inc.
Hunsinger and Allen are betting on sports becoming even more intertwined with social media in the future.
“I think actually we’re just on the front edge of a wave,” Hunsinger said. “I think that it’s going to continue to explode.”
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