Google Launches Lively

In today’s fast moving ICT world it may now be thought a little late in the day to make a posting about Google’s new virtual world Lively (originally launched back at the start of July); there may still be a few out there however (like myself) who have yet to come across it and, given the great degree of interest in the use of Second Life for education purposes (see here for example and here), it may be worth TELCop’s time to keep an eye out on this one. First impressions are that it’s much more basic than Second Life (fewer features, much more basic graphics) and also maybe a little buggy (it seems to keep crashing on me) but rooms can apparently be embedded in a Web page (haven’t got this far yet myself) and there is integration with lots of other web2.0 stuff like Facebook, and MySpace. Some of the features it seems are based on consultation with university students, Google say:

Prior to this release, we worked closely with Arizona State University. Based on feedback from ASU students and with help from the Google Desktop team, we added support for playing YouTube videos in virtual TVs and showing photos in virtual picture frames inside our rooms. Better yet, the gadgets you have in your Lively rooms can also run on your desktop.

Reaction as yet appears mixed but with Google behind it and this kind of clever integration it may be we’re about to hear a whole lot more about the new services within and outside the TEL world.

Regards,

Gearóid

August 7, 2008 · Filed Under Virtual World, Web 3.0

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