Chat Comes Alive with Google`s Lively - Is Chat All There Is?
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The rooms are full-color, fully interactive, fully dimensional -- why not go full throttle ahead? Google Lively may offer features which are different from other chat rooms, but it may not offer much more. Is chat all there is when you're using Google Lively?
Lively offers other features which allow you to integrate your Lively creations on your MySpace page or personal site if you wish. You can offer a link so that others can view information on your Lively room (should you create one) and other details. But when it comes to creation with Google Lively, don't expect to go too far outside the lines and limitations.
When you go to design your avatar, you'll find you can create a male, female or even an animal, but your choices in appearance are somewhat curtailed. The catalog offers several different clothing items in many different pages of pictures. You'll find many different styles and even time periods represented, even strange costumes and somewhat fantastic creations. Even so, the clothing choices seem too few and many of the hair styles too farfetched.
When it comes to creating your avatar and rooms with Lively, what you see on the catalog is what you get. Unlike Second Life (an online world to which Lively is often compared), users cannot create products or buy and sell them among themselves. You can only use the catalog to create what you will with Lively.
The room designs offer a blank canvas in many different shapes and styles, so you can place furniture and decorative items within at will. Everything from chairs to wall stickers is included in the design catalog, which contains completely free items for your Lively use. With Lively, you do not have to earn credit or currency to enjoy every aspect of the virtual world.
Lively Controversy
Though Lively is still relatively new on the Internet scene, it has already made a few headlines for pornographic and sexually explicit content. There are some rooms on Lively that bear the word "Sex" in the title and there have been claims of inappropriate images inside the world.
Google's Terms clearly prohibit nudity and sexually explicit content on Lively, as it bans rooms designed for sexual purposes. In response to the recent attention toward this issue, Google has promised to crack down on such violations and address improper content inside Lively rooms.
What's It All About?
Google's Lively is for recreational chatting and socialization. Extra elements that allow you to integrate personal Web pages and other networking features, along with the three-dimensional rooms and personalization, put Lively a cut above other text-based chat rooms out there. This is, however, still a very limited world with limited choices and design options.
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