Google shutting down virtual world 'Lively'

A scene from 'Lively,' the virtual world Google launched in July and which it said Wednesday it is closing at the end of the year.

(Credit: Google)

Once thought to be its answer to virtual worlds like Second Life, Google's Lively launched this summer to much fanfare.

Lively was Web-based and allowed anyone to set up virtual spaces, such as rooms, that could be embedded onto blogs or Facebook pages.

But the project never picked up much steam.

Now, Google has decided to shut the project down.

"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," Google said on its official blog Wednesday evening. "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."

The post said that those who were working on the Lively team would be reassigned to other areas within Google, suggesting that the move does not mean layoffs.

Google also said that because the project is being shut completely down, it is encouraging "all Lively users to capture your hard work by taking videos and screenshots of your rooms."

Disclaimer: My wife works at Second Life publisher Linden Lab.

[Duke Rusty]

I never knew of Lively until now.

[slecalvez]

How is this news? Lively sucked from the beginning!!!! It was one attempt more for Google to develop something... anything... and see if it catches on. One of many useless projects in their labs.google.com page. This is one of many desperate attempts for Google to diversify their revenue model.

[Vegaman_Dan]

I too don't recall ever hearing about this product. Google didn't do enough to promote it apparently.

[Imalittleteapot]

When it first launched I thought it might be a cool idea, but I tried it on two different computers with different ISPs and I just couldn't get logged into it. It would just freeze in the login process. I don't know what I was doing wrong, but I just couldn't get it to work for me for some reason.

[westrajc]

Lively was a hastily thrown together experiment that neither had the ability to compete with Second Life (SL) as a serious adult/business-oriented Virtual World, nor enough general tween or focused adolescent appeal to compete with the likes of www.Zwinky.com or www.BarbieGirls.com.

Watch for SL to ultimately wind up as a bidding target between Google and Microsoft, much as they competed for Yahoo, but with one of them actually winding up buying it. My money is on Microsoft, who despite a public preference for "reality enhancement" technologies, will realize that a Second Life-type client could make a terrific next-generation PowerPoint tool and be a much needed boost for their XBox personal gaming business.

An interesting item for those of us in Second Life to note, is Google's admonition for people to copy their Lively rooms to preserve all their "hard work." Because of IP theft concerns, SL offers no built-in method of backing up everything you have created and purchased. If SL ever decides to follow the Lively path into "virtual oblivion," hundreds of thousands of hours of creativity and millions of dollars in purchased value could be lost forever.

This is a first news about this environment I ever see or hear. Probably lack of promotion. Google should have promoted it as intensively as he does with Chrome browser.
Krisjtan.

[The User]

Well, Chrome isn't doing so great either. It peaked at 1.4% of the market share shortly after the release and steadily slid to below 0.7% in November.

[All American Boy]

Chrome? What's that? Haven't seen that advertised anywhere...

[loose_screw]

No surprises here after having seen the beta product. Not much to talk about, move on.

[inachu]

I never EVER saw a direct link to a working URL so I never used it.
AKA... BAD ADVERTISEMENT.

[jpirkola]

I think days are over for proprietary virtual worlds, because they will be shut down, eventually. What would have web become if there was only hosted web servers that offer you a space for web pages? In the future I believe in open source solutions in this space, like opensimulator and realxtend are providing already.

[The User]

I am not too crazy about Google's corporate strategy. It seems to be incapable of achieving any significant results beyond its core search technology. With every product release comes disappointment. Partially I attribute it to Google's corporate culture - no time to waste on design and features, let's roll out half-baked featureless product and see if anyone will use it.

[WhirledMaow]

The problem with lively is the fact that all there is to do on the site is chat and wander around peoples rooms.

Where's the games, where's the player created content?

Oh, that's right..... it's at www.Whirled.com

Maybe Google should've had a chat with Three Rings on a business model...


Too little too late google, but good try.

[atinilk]

I'm really surprised to read they're pulling the plug so soon, what with their reasources and all. With all the VW hype recently after the SL explosion, they've been popping up like mushrooms and failing just as quick. If you're interested in these virtual environments check out Entropia Universe. Software and registration are free and they've been around for a few years - a nice mix of VW/MMO with a real economy. Good community too.

[Len Bullard]

Virtual worlds customers are the dumbest customers on the web. Every other form of web content has some way to rehost when a vendor dies or abandons a product. Only graphics artists and their customers are arrogant or dumb enough to keep pushing vendors who refuse to adopt standards or protect their customers from their own incompetent business decisions.

All of the conformant VRML97 written in 1998 still runs in 2008. Apparently, the furries are not just a little smarter than the Lindens and the Livelies.

[jeetix1]

DONT DESTROY LIVELY!

[livelyzens]

The Livelyzens (Lively users) are coming together to appeal to Google to keep Lively alive.

Lively is a great platform for interaction as well as creativity. It is easy to use, browser based, embeddable on webpages to bring a 3D experience right on your website. While Lively has been in beta and has limited capability in terms of the objects and avatars available, the Livelyzens have been able to come up with very creative ways to create art from what is available. All this in a "clean" 3D world thanks to Google's vigilance in getting rid of rooms with inappropriate content. More than anything, Lively has become a place to make friends for life - from all over the world with wonderful people.


Please visit our website http://livelyzens.com and participate in the Lively Machinima contest we are conducting to show the creative potential of Google Lively. Please also sign our online petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/golively/petition.html

We request netizens to support us in reviving a wonderful 3D world that is a kid friendly and a creative space for art and interaction amongst adults.

[cardoza123]

You should check out vivaty.com. It's relatively new in virtual world realm, but had a lot of potential.