Rumors that Google was working on a new virtual world have turned out to be true. The company unveiled this week its three-dimensional make-believe community called Lively, promoted in the video below.
Virtual-world scholars seem unimpressed by the project. The Terra Nova blog has assembled their comments. Aaron Delwiche, an assistant professor of communications at Trinity University, is disappointed that Lively does not allow people to create their own content, a feature of the virtual world Second Life. “Google has given us an impoverished space in which content can only be developed in-house or by ‘trusted developers,’” he writes.
Vili Lehdonvirta, a researcher at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology, says this about Mr. Delwiche’s observation. “I don’t think it’s true that Second Life style dedicated tools for creating complex 3D content are a prerequisite for creativity and expression. People used to build pianos out of fish steaks and chessboards in Ultima Online,” he writes of the popular three-dimensional game. “Still, I agree that it would be really cool if Google came out with advanced content creation tools that are easy to use.” —Andrea L. Foster
