Lively is the newest social networking website beta-released by Google. Online friends, in the “person” of their animated avatars, meet in 3D chatrooms. Here is the video Google made to introduce Lively:

Lively went live for user testing just two months ago (I learned about it in from this blog post). It is still in its beta phase, so expect some difficulties from delayed responses to the worst - system hangup. The problems, may have been caused at my end. I was experiencing slow internet performance with other sites too. [Update 9/27: 3D-chatted with ex-officemates who are now in Colorado USA and Vancouver CA. Both experienced freezing moments specially during their first attempt. One of them was popping in and out of the chat because instead of waiting it out, he was clicking X (close window) whenever he can't type a text or can't move his avatar. My tip: be patient, it's still in beta.]

Despite the “bummers”, I was able to create my own 3D Coffee Lounge and to check out some newbie-friendly chatrooms. Here’s a screenshot of my visit to a 3D chatroom that looks like it's winter all over.

The call-outs or speech bubbles are text chats that disappear when new texts are typed. (Not to worry, because you can always look at the chat history.)

This virtual room was created by the real person behind the female avatar on the right. I, rather, the avatar-me in the middle, made friends with her and the male avatar when avatar-me first met them in a nice rooftop-like lounge chatroom. In Lively, making friends means adding their avatar names in my list of contacts. They were nice to avatar-me so I looked for them the next time I logged-in. I knew where to find them because my contact list displays which room my Lively friends are. Then I sort of followed them in the winter wonderland room. My tip – don’t accept friend requests from some avatars you don’t want following you.

Here’s an updated Google Lively FAQ listing tips and tricks for newbies.

Overall, notwithstanding technical glitches, the Lively experience is a fun way to show your (imagined) creativity, hangout with online friends, meet new ones, get-together with colleagues and classmates.

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Unleashing my (imagined) creativity, I interior-designed my own coffee lounge as a cozy space for online friends and colleagues. The lounge is a 3D chatroom in Google's Lively, just one of many virtual rooms created by Google users.

I enjoyed doing the interiors - rearranging sofas and coffee tables, hanging picture frames with my real-life landscape photos, attaching a video screen with streaming video of an MTV (Music Television) from YouTube, its music providing a relaxing mood in my coffee lounge.

Lively is a fun way to chat online. My avatar-self, together with my online friends' own avatars, can move around the 3D chatroom. Avatar gestures beat smileys and emoticons in exagerated ways. Laugh and cry go with the proper sounds, with face contortions and arms flailing in an amusing manner. Roll on the floor laughing (rofl) becomes literal. It is always pleasing to see your friend's avatar jump up and down to show she's happy.

It is still in its testing phase (beta), but it is more stable now than when it first came out early July 2008. To see what Google is doing to address user problems, see this post on Q&A with a Google Lively Experience designer.

If you want to check out a 3D chatroom, you can visit my coffee lounge, called The Kape Shop. My tip: move around the 3D chatroom by mouse click-dragging your avatar or just clicking on any spot in the room. Catch me online; virtual-me is the avatar named melailah (as in me-jane, you-tarzan). See you there!

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Here are two good videos to introduce you to Second Life.



This one shows Second Life possibilities to education.

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You think a techie and a web-savvy person would know? Not Mr. H, who spends most of his awake time in front of a computer - websurfing and logging to techie forums here and there. He asked me, "Second life? As in, your life after this one? But it can be your third life... and what if you reincarnate as a bird?!"

Mr. H, in Second Life, we can chose to be anything we want to be. You see, SL is a web-based 3D virtual world. Much like an online role-playing game, but more. In Second Life:

• You have an online identity or avatar, its look limited only by your creativity or fantasy. My avatar is a pony-tailed, sexy girl in denim pants, body-hugging shirt and comfy sandals - my look when I was in college years ago. Beep... Ok, drop the sexy. :-) I am not stuck with this look though. In SL you can change your look anytime. I can transform my avatar to a more voluptuous virtual-me in a daring outfit, or a prim and proper barbie-like princess.

• You can socialize with other SL residents in cafes, bars, go dancing at clubs, or be by your lone self and visit a zoo, a planetarium, a botanical garden, a beach. Tour a replica of Moscow's Red Square, Beijing's Forbidden City, or France's Chateau de Versailles. Take pics for souvenir!
  

• You can go shopping, watch concerts, sport events. Get into sports that you'll never be able to, in real life. Don't need to worry about falling off board when you windsurf at SL.
  

• You can run a business - a REAL business. SL residents trade in Linden dollars L$ with L$263=US$1. But you can get by in SL without money. Like I do.
  

• You can attend meetings, trainings, virtual classes about SL and real life topics. For example, you can learn basic German, conversational English or software skills such as digital photo editing.

In SL, you can do almost anything, be anybody and be anywhere you like. So you see Mr. H, Second Life is not the Next Life!

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