In yet another example of how Google’s 20% freedom program is driving innovation and experimentation, the company just announced a new application that may eventually rival Second Life. It’s called Lively, and the idea is to create a social network that’s more fun, and more immersive than traditional destinations like Facebook and MySpace.

Reserving 20% of an employee’s time for independent projects has certainly paid off for Google. Examples include Gmail, Google News, Orkut, Adsense, and now Lively. What’s the big draw? Lively promises to bring users one level closer to a real life experience while still in a virtual world.

Instead of just a voice or text conversation, Lively allows a visually rich experience where you can look at another person’s avatar and surroundings, learning about their personality without ever saying or asking a thing. Add in sound effects and animated emotes and the deal sounds better still.

Google has even continued with the spirit of remixing content by enabling YouTube videos to be contained in virtual televisions, and allowing web site owners to embed virtual worlds within their sites. Viral marketing anyone? It’s a good move, and will likely encourage adoption. Advertisers also might take more interest in YouTube as a compelling platform if it continues to show up in new mediums.

Lively creator Niniane Wang, Engineering Manager at Google describes it well when she says:

You can . . . 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]]”.

I guess people in general feel more comfortable hugging in a virtual world than they do in a real world. But is it as satisfying?

Related:

Google Lively is lively no more

Google launches question and answers site in China

Google Chrome to come pre-installed on computers?

Life Magazine’s photo archive gives Google a sense of history

Google puts a shrimp on the barbie with Aussie blog

Entry was posted on Tuesday, July 8th, 2008 at 11:36 pm under Google, Internet, Web2.0.  Print This Post

Read more entries by Matt Jansen.
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