That Danny!
Lively Google – Google Lively: Google launches Google Lively 3D Service.
Note: If you are looking for an article on how to embed Google Lively into your website go here.
Not a day passes without a new 3D world start-up launching, trying to cash in on the new 3d world fashion. The aim (apart from getting some of that free-circulating funding cash) is to try and make something usable out of a technology that is still ahead of its time and of the hardware we use in our homes.
It all started when Linden Labs created a great PR success out of Second Life, although the PR didn’t quite match up with usability and user enthusiasm. Most Second Life users would come in, play with it for a day, and then leave. Either their computers weren’t up for the job, or they found navigation and moving around a bit too clunky.
Another take on the 3d Worlds proposition is to create an embeddable 3D room, which webmasters can add to their portals or websites, and decorate as they wish. In effect, the 3D element is a plug-in to enhance sites, and thus it appeals to the Long Tail as well as corporates.
Google has now joined this trend and launched “Lively”, a 3d room you can create in minutes and add to your site. This is where Google’s principle that their engineers can work on a pet project 20% of their time really comes into its own. Niniane Wang, Engineering Manager at Google was responsible for this one, and in the official Google Blog said:
A while ago, I looked around the social web and wished that it could be less static. Sure, you can leave a comment on a blog or write a text blurb on your social networking profile. But what if you want to express yourself in a more fun way, with 3D graphics and real-time avatar interactions? I started asking this question as a 20% project, and I’m excited to announce today’s release of Lively by Google – a 3D virtual experience that is the newest addition to Google Labs.
The Lively team wants to help people experience another dimension of the web. We hope you will use the product to express yourself with and without words, and to do this in the places you already visit on the web.
If you enter a Lively room embedded on your favorite blog or website, you can immediately get a sense of the room creator’s interests, just by looking at the furniture and environment they chose. You can also express your own personality by customizing your avatar’s look, showing people who you are without having to say a word. Of course, you can chat with each other, and you can also interact through animated actions. In our user research, we’ve been amazed at how much more poignant it is to receive an animated hug than seeing the text “[[hug]]”. (source).
As this is a “20% project”, I wouldn’t read too much into it as Google’s attempts at entering a new niche or making another world domination statement. It is simply one of their engineer projects that actually worked out as a good usable product. Whether our hardware is still a little too rigid for navigating 3D is a pertinent question, but it’s better than quite a few others that I’ve seen out there.
UPDATE: Google Lively has announced that it is shutting down its service on 31 December 2008. More details here.
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