Google Gets Lively

Shock of all shocks – Google has decided to jump on the virtual bandwagon with its own virtual world – Lively. I decided to check it out and the overall feedback from others playing around is, that at this point, its a glorified chat room. And maybe that’s all its intended to be. You have a few avatar options to choose from and a few pieces of clothing. The service is web-based, so you just need a Google account and to download the small desktop appliance to use it. Avatars can set up chat “rooms” fully furnished to converse, dance and even puke on their fellow “roommates”. While at some point Lively may compete with Second Life, I don’t think that it will be any time soon. Moving from room-to-room is a little clunky and it seems that every link opens a new browser window. Lively has a lot of room to grow. It will be interesting to see where Google takes it.