Google公司刚刚宣布，其旗下“ME TOO”推出的虚拟世界服务Google Lively在推出仅仅6个月后，将于今年12月31日关闭。
Google利用综合的YouTube展现了一个3D的具体化环境，Lively提供了各种3D虚拟形象和空间供网友选择，透过这项服务，网友们将可以在浏览器上建立起自己的虚拟世界，进入各个公开场合或是自行搭构一个个人空间，与其它网友进行聊天、分享等各种交流，就像另一种版本的Second Life，只不过，在Lively中并没有货币制度，而且不需要下载庞大的游戏主程序即可利用浏览器进行。
毫无疑问，Google此举向当前已十分风靡的Second Life网站发起挑战。Google认为，Lively将吸引更多的人们走进这一虚拟现实世界，因为它不仅仅是一个类似于Second Life网站，更重要的是无需任何成本。只要从lively.com网站上下载并安装一款小软件，用户就可以通过其他网站，如社交网站或博客网站进入Lively世界。Google已经为Facebook网站开发出一项Lively应用，并且已经成为Facebook的热点地区。目前，Google正在为MySpace开发Lively应用。
有关专家曾表示，Google的虚拟世界Lively是一个良好的创意，然而由于存在一系列缺陷，Lively已经逐渐走向失败。由于其使用简单，Lively在推出之初被认为具有极大的潜力。然而在运营数周之后，Lively的用户仍然很少并且呈下降趋势。此外，许多业内人士针对该服务发表了负面的评价。
虽然虚拟世界Frenzy已十分风靡，但Google Lively新登场又要退场的命运却不可避免。Google推出的这项服务还必须与已建立的像There.com，IMVU，甚至是主题道具MTV的虚拟拉古纳海滩进行竞争。通过竞争的统计资料显示，Lively的通信量已接近边缘状态。考虑到目前的经济状况，Google不能再提供资源支持用于一个新生项目。该公司在官方博客的帖子上承认：这是一个艰难的决定，但我们希望确保我们优先考虑我们的资源和更专注于核心搜索，广告和应用软件业务。
Lively no more：
After careful consideration, we have decided to shut down Lively.
Since Lively’s launch, we have been delighted to see the creative ways you’ve used the product. We enjoyed hanging out in Jen’s coffee house, and checking out the Brasil Party room. We got a kick out of the YouTube videos in a variety of languages telling stories about your avatars. And we’ve been awed by the elaborate rooms that you’ve constructed, using mosaic tiles and photo gadgets in novel ways.
We will shut down Lively on December 31, 2008. Embedded rooms in blogs and other web pages will continue to show an image, but users will no longer be able to enter Lively rooms and interact.
Between now and the end of the year we encourage you to capture all your hard work by taking videos and screenshots of your rooms. Thank you for sharing this experience with us. We’ve learned a lot about how users interact in rich social environments, and we hope you’ve enjoyed your time with Lively.
For more information, please read our blog post.
Lively no more：
11/19/2008 05:55:00 PM
In July we launched Lively in Google Labs because we wanted users to be able to interact with their friends and express themselves online in new ways. Google has always been supportive of this kind of experimentation because we believe it’s the best way to create groundbreaking products that make a difference to people’s lives. But we’ve also always accepted that when you take these kinds of risks not every bet is going to pay off.
That’s why, despite all the virtual high fives and creative rooms everyone has enjoyed in the last four and a half months, we’ve decided to shut Lively down at the end of the year. It has been a tough decision, but we want to ensure that we prioritize our resources and focus more on our core search, ads and apps business. Lively.com will be discontinued at the end of December, and everyone who has worked on the project will then move on to other teams.
We’d encourage all Lively users to capture your hard work by taking videos and screenshots of your rooms.
今天刚注意到这个
有家中国公司又重新做了个
叫Newlively
http://www.willizm.cn/archives/87
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