Noah Ark Party~Imvu

--
Cherry

lively n me

dunno really what to say for once..or how to begin..
for some who had not had much to do with vr before
the experience of lively was so liberating ...n
the sudden "END'
we were boonswoggled n sidesmacked with a 2 x 4...

still trying to process it.

i had lost my 'heart', but didn't know it.
''oh, growing up, how nice..no more joy/tears/dancing/laughter/up till dawn...what a relief''

then suddenly finding one's 'heart' again, so unexpectedly....
it's not just the joy, but the sorrows as well
the shyness/disappointments/missed opportunities/'if only's''

and, besides all that ...it was a family, of many different ages....i miss them all.

so in going around now in 'rl'...
i see a kid or older person and instead of being impatient...
i think ''oh, that could be my friend one day grown old, or her/his child...''
and what does it cost to be kind anyway?

i can leave when i do...a more fragrant world, for those who come after....
simply because,
i learned to 'love' again
in lively.

belavar.

Lively memory

~Lively~

I can't begin to thank Google for starting Lively. I know I am not the only one. There is a diehard contingency out there, be it a small one, that will never forget or stop missing the place. They tried so hard to save it when Google tolled the death bell in the beginning of December 2008. It was a sad day indeed. We had become like a real life community, with friendships and romances and everything in between. I, myself, had never really belonged to any type of real world community. Real life communities often judge you on how you look, what kind of job you have, and not on who the person is inside of you. This is what made Lively so unique and special. Sure, you could choose to look a certain way with the cute little avatars, but everyone pretty much looked the same. This gave people the chance to let the inner soul within themselves come through. It came out with words, words, the most powerful and accurate way to really know a person. Ah Lively…..I do miss my little Rose……

Livelyzens Costume Party!

Happy Birthday Kana !

Time: 01:00 JST 29th Dec 2008 Other time zones

Party Room

Happy Birthday YZ !!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY YZ !!

Join YZ's Birthday Party at the Lively Room below

Midnight JST time December 11th. (See Other timezones here)

Happy Birthday Solum Deus!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SOLUM !!

Our Letter # 2 To Google

An Appeal from Citizens of Lively
(#2 - sent 12/9/2008)

Dear Google,

Thank you for your timely response. We are glad to note that you have read our letters, blogs and are visiting our rooms!

Since our last writing to you, we have several things to share with you.

1) The power of Lively - Concept rooms
We told you about our plan to create concept rooms to show how Lively could be extended usefully and in conjunction with other Google products. Our friends RandomHuman, freecoconuts and Binmei have worked tirelessly on these!

a ) BabelMiss - TranslatorBot roomWe created a a Lively room BabelMiss that has a translator bot integrated with Google Translator. BabelMiss has now gone multilingual! - Spanish, Portugese, japanese.Room url: http://www.lively.com/search?query=babelmiss

b) "Constructor's Break" - A Lively Board GameYou can now play games on Lively! This boardgame room lets you roll a dicebot by saying "roll" and avatars move on the board till they reach the lemonade stand!
Room url: http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=3969167695737978121
Video: http://blip.tv/file/1548846

c) "Sam - The clairvoyant crystal skull" - Fortune Teller RoomThe room loads random fortune text in a picture frame to tell your fortune!
Room url: http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=-6843311765851474965

d) Lively Chime System - Avatar entry notifier via emailThe room displays your entry time in PST, EST, JST, GMT and also sends you an email indicating you have a visitor in your room!Room url: http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=-5139025568371294386

Imagine the possibilities! So many ways you can leverage it for your core business of search, ads, and apps.

2) Lively for Business interaction
Lively was used as a Virtual Recruitment Tool by Weavelink - a french event organizer company who conducted the first Virtual Campus Recruitment for students on Lively.http://livelyzens.blogspot.com/2008/12/mystery-solved.html

3) Lively Contests
As you may know, we are conducting a machinima video contest, slideshow contest, Stained Glass competition using Lively glass tile objects and a Lolcats/Lolbears contest! The response has been amazing and we have some stellar entries! The grand awards show will be conducted at Lively on December 14th 2008. We will be sure to send you an invitation! You can see the contest entries at: room url: http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=7558771319950950056

4) A Lively Wedding
IzzieBellah & mrfoxyy had a lovely lively wedding on Saturday, December 6th 2008.
Invitiation: http://livelyzens.blogspot.com/2008/12/lively-wedding-invitation-izziebellah.html
Video: http://pony.blip.tv/file/1555273/

5) We also have some sad news to share with you
Our good friend Malon from Germany lost his childhood friend "Achille" to throat cancer and writes:

"Its a story about a guy, a nice guy, a sportive guy whos fate was to become ill
of cancer of the throat. Finally they had to remove his throat and that meant to
leave his voice. He never was fond of using special technical equipment like the
mechanical voice, it was to him like a robot was speaking. Then in July he
discovered Lively by announcement in the newspapers. He used long ago
3-D-platforms like second life and World of Warcraft. But when they moved
out his voice he abandoned these systems because they showed him worlds of sane
and strong characters, and he himself felt not to be able to fulfilling these
options. But there were these funny comic-looking guys and girls in a some
comic-surreal looking environment of so much and awesome looking worlds of
shells. And he was magnetised of these characters running up and down in them,
laughing, crying, sadding, cheering, bowing, pleading, rofling..... And he
discovered that this were the hands of every of them behind the keyboards in
front of their screens acting these characters and - this was a very important
expression to him - "saying" all the words to be read in the bubbles. And
he began to run an own avatar, an own character, laughing, bowing, crying,
rofling!His own hands became his own voice, and it was not even more the robots
voice, it was HIS OWN VOICE ! "I feel happy", he wrote to me on his PC,
standing at the side of his bed in the hospital. And he lived up as a nice
sportive guy he was. He died 3 days before Google announced to shut Lively
down. They said to his family that he died smiling......"

6) "In Google We Trusted and Now Our Project's Busted"
The 7th and 9th graders at Camilla, Geogria are heartbroken because their Digital Citizenship project is coming to an abrupt end just when they have finished making their rooms.
As their teacher Vicki Davis (coolcatteacher) writes on their blog:

"A heck of a great potential tool is about to go away on December 31, 2008.
Google's lively - while not perfect in many ways runs on a standard web browser
and provides a way to create private rooms to teach in a 3d environment

.....

Google sets a precedent here and unless we make it very loud and
clear, other services will go away in the future with no warning and no user
alternatives."

These students even wrote a post 10 Ways for Lively to Make Money as a message to you. They love everything Google and are using Picasa, google Docs, and Google Blogger for their Digiteen Dream Team blog.

And they are not the only ones. Laura's high school students at Liceo Gramsci school at Ivrea, North West Italy are using Lively for language learning and creativity. Antonio's students at Portugal have been using Lively for language skills. Kern Kelly's elementary school students at Maine are disappointed too. Google Lively served as an easily accessible 3D medium for these and many other students. Least did they or anyone expect that you would pull out a public beta product.

As Kern Kelly, the teacher from Maine writes "As a teacher, Lively has been an amazing platform to showcase student work. We use the space for students, teachers and parents to virtually walk through the projects my students are doing. As a vehicle for 'newbie' parents to immerse themselves with the work of there children, it is invaluable."

The fact that you have not provided a way for us to download our rooms that we worked so hard on is making our anguish greater. While the rooms are all made from basic objects like tiles, benches and couches... the end product is beyond anything you can imagine. They are truly pieces of art that need to be preserved - and pictures and video just do not do justice. Please see these samples: Red Muffler, Cafe Racer, Aether, Sphere

We know that you have re-stated your decision in your reply to us. What we are asking you to do is re-consider your decision or atleast let Lively stay for atleast 2 more months - it is just gaining popularity especially among the student community and would give people a chance to see if the service is worthwhile. We think your product is way ahead of all other virtual worlds out there in terms of concept, art/animation and ease of use. Further as you can see, you have serious users of the product that are being affected drammatically by your decision.

Ok, so what are we asking for?

1. Please RECONSIDER continuing Lively atleast for an extended period of time (even without upgrades/new features). Livelyzens and the student groups will take on responsibility to bring in new users and increase userbase. If you can open content development during this extended period of time, that would be very useful in getting new users.

2. After serious reconsideration, if you still think you will not be able to continue Lively or even extend it for a short time, then we ask

a) That you allow us to download our rooms as standalone 3D objects that we can view even though we will not be able to interact. This is very important in order to preserve all the wonderful artwork on Lively.

b) That you consider open-sourcing Lively or seeking a buyer who can continue Lively. It truly deserves to live on.

We implore you, live up to your "Don't Be Evil" motto. Please do not just close this email and ask your Lively help team to give us a generic reply. Please please revisit your decision and we look forward to your response to our specific requests.

And finally if you have 7 more minutes, you can view our video appeal at: http://blip.tv/file/1548918

As we have stated, we are prepared as a group to work with Google to help make Lively a vibrant and successful operation. Thank you for your time and attention.

Yours sincerely,

The Citizens of Lively
livelyzens@gmail.com
http://www.livelyzens.com/

Google's Response to Our Letter #1

On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 12:12 PM, Lively Support Team <help@lively.com> wrote:


Dear Citizens of Lively,
Yesterday we received your letters, and we wanted to thank you forsharing your feedback and ideas on the future of Lively. The LivelyZenswebsite, rooms, and blog posts have been making the rounds internally.We truly appreciate your passion for the product.


The decision to shut down Lively was a difficult one, but in the end, itwas a question of setting priorities. We've always believed inexperimenting and taking risks, and Lively is an example of this. However,as a company, it's important for us to focus resources on our corebusiness of search, ads, and apps. This is why we've decided to shut downthe product.


We are considering several alternatives with respect to Lively'stechnology, however we have nothing to announce at this time.


We'll continue to communicate our plans and shutdown time line through theLively help group (http://groups.google.com/group/lively-help).


Again, thank you for contacting us.


Best regards,

Google

Our Letter # 1 To Google

An Appeal from Citizens of Lively
(#1 - Sent on 12/1/2008)



We are writing this letter on behalf of the varied and many citizens of Lively. Your recent decision to terminate Lively at the end of the year both saddened and shocked us.

The world you created – Lively – is the finest 3D world on the net today. Its excellent graphics, ease of use and interactive and harmless animations have brought together a group of users worldwide. The citizens of Lively (Livelyzens) are made up of all nationalities, all ages and all professions. We interact daily in rooms that have been built by ourselves with incredible attention to detail and artistic love. Some of these rooms like "CRY (Child Rights and You)" and "Multiple Sclerosis Sucks" have been created to serve a social good by their owners. We have created lasting friendships and have brought our worlds closer together. To see this end so dramatically has created an emptiness for many of us and anger for a few. We have attempted to demonstrate our passion for your 3D world by making other netizens aware of Lively through letters to social networking sites and blogs, news reports such as VirtualWorldNews.com, NetworkWorld.com etc., conducting YouTube machinima video and Lolcats/Lolbears contests as well as the preparation of an online petition which can be seen on our website at www.livelyzens.com.

We emphasize that this is your 3D world and we are aware that you are free to do with it as you see fit. We also understand that the current economic times are difficult and companies must and will attempt to rationalize their operations in turn. However we strongly believe that the decision to terminate Lively is a mistake. Having seen about 14 other 3D worlds recently has simply fortified our belief that Lively is the strongest and best built 3D world on the internet today. We believe that over time this will be seen by many new users as the 3D world of choice. The ability to integrate current Google products such as Translator, Search, Gmail/Gtalk, Google Earth and others exists as does the ability to advertise. This can be demonstrated by the recent Lively rooms creation of "BabelMiss - Spanish" and "BabelMiss - Portugese" which have a TranslatorBot Avatar that translate Portugese/Spanish to English and other languages. This feature not only facilitates communication within our multilingual virtual world but also demonstrates how Google Lively can be used as a learning tool. The room was engineered by by RandomHuman and Freecoconuts – both Livelyzens.

We understand that our plea should not be a one way street. We, as a group, are prepared to work with Google to make Lively successful. Our group would be prepared to aid Google in monitoring of the site for inappropriate behavior and content with the aim of becoming a self -regulating community governed by community-driven-standards like other sites like DMOZ and forming a volunteer team to ensure members follow the standards. Furthermore, our group, among other things, would be prepared to source new users and host events to enhance the users experience and develop long term users like ourselves. We stress that our group is prepared to discuss all options including a fee based service and would look forward to an opportunity to discuss further concepts with you in more detail.

We, the citizens of Lively, ask – no plead – that you reconsider your decision to terminate Lively. As we have stated, we are prepared as a group to work with Google to help make Lively a vibrant and successful operation.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Yours sincerely,

The Citizens of Lively
livelyzens@gmail.com


Please also see our personal stories and appeals, you will be amazed:
http://livelyzens.com/blog.aspx
http://groups.google.com/group/livelyzens/web/appeals

Petition Signatures at:
www.petitiononline.com/golively/petition.html

Lively Rooms we'd like you to see:
"BabelMiss - Spanish" http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=7499084429716312257
"CRY (Child Rights and You)" http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=-6651047970893709589
"Multiple Sclerosis Sucks" http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=-9150027984174659009
"LHP: Best of 2008" http://www.lively.com/dr?rid=983957584344161318

Related Links:
Our website: www.livelyzens.com
Pictures of Livelyzens: http://livelyzens.com/picturegallery.aspx
Lively Contests: http://www.livelyzens.com/contests.aspx
Our Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/livelyzens

Lively Wedding Invitation - IzzieBellah & mrfoxyy

Enter Livelyz Only Wedding Chapel (click below)

To Mel Guymon from Jessikah

Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 19:43:16 -0800 (PST)


To:
Mr. Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Hello my name is Jessikah Mercer and I will start by saying that I think it is obsurd that Google would choose to shut Lively down without even mentioning it to anyone until the last minute. I have seen all of us put so much time and work in our rooms and I just can't believe we are being told to take pictures.

We all come on everyday and are inspired to do creative things with our rooms. I have met so many wonderful people on here. A few of my fav. rooms were made by Jmichael, Kos, CS, Rossen, Imajika, Shane and Tanya, Thor, Blacksheep, Brittany, Luis, Sqeak, jeetix, Cristal, Merigoth, Nova, Kat,­­ Yole, Rose, DolphinMermaid, Beetle, Solum and these are not the only people trust me I could go on for hours. But these people here not in any order they all have left a spot in my mind and my heart with thier wonderful conversation and they are fantastic Artist's. They all are wonderful people and great to have finally met so many great people from all over the World. Now after we have finally found a great place to come and spend time together and time building our lovely rooms. Your asking us to take pictures of it and give our email addresses to keep in touch.

So we are all not asking we are all begging that you do not shut Lively down or make it an open source so that way we can go on. We have so many great minds involved here so it can definitly be done. I have seen so many great things and been to so many great places on here and I will be so torn to see that all thrown away because your project isn't doing how well you want it to be doing. It will only get better from here. Now that we all know there is a problem we are doing everything to get everyone we know signing up for Lively. If you also needed to make a subscription price whatever is nec. we will do because we love the people we have met and we need to be able to keep the art we have made. Thank you so much for your time! And please do take all that we are doing into consideration.

~Jessikah
http://www.livelyzens.com/
http://savinglivelyforthezens.ning.com/

To Mel Guymon from Shiakara

Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 15:44:40 -0800 (PST)


To Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Dear Mr. Guymon,

First, I want to thank you for whatever part you had in bringing Lively to fruition. In the brief time that it has existed I have made friends with such amazing people. We may live thousands of miles apart and speak in a cacophony of native tongues but what Lively has done is allowed us to discover a common bond that connects us. In fact, I think it may be the single greatest bond that people can share. We have discovered the things that make us different are minimal and unimportant, they are brilliantly outshined by those things which make us the same. We all have joy and sorrows, triumphs and disappointments and incredible life stories waiting to be told.

We are not Matty Bears, Heathers and Hamlets, we are living breathing people who are sharing a marvelous experience. In this short time we have become a real community, a tiny Utopia of friends living in peaceful co-existence. You should be proud that Lively has allowed such a magical thing to happen.

I know it's your job to look at the bottom line and that even if you understand how we feel your obligations lie elsewhere. That is why we hang onto the hope, as a community, that we can somehow work with Google to come up with a way to ease the financial burden that keeping Lively would create.

Please respond to us, Mr. Guymon, as we anxiously await a reply from Google. Thank you for reading our letters.

Sincerely,
Shiakara, Proud to be a Livelyzen

To Mel Guymon from KosmiK Guru

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 10:58:42 -0800 (PST)

To
Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Dear Mr. Guymon,

I am not sure what is compelling me to sit here and write to you today. There's something about Lively... !!

When the announcement came, I logged into Lively and made a room to Keep Lively Alive. Within seconds, the room was full - I put out extra couches to accomodate everyone. We sat in a circle watching our chat bubbles - of shock, of disbelief, of panic, of grief... I knew then that what we had here was too precious and it had to be saved. I have spent the last 6 days ever since the announcement doing nothing but think about how we can save Lively from being shutdown. And I am not alone - there is a big community on Lively that is devastated bythe news about the shutdown. We are all working overtime trying to figure out how we can reach out to Google and explain our reasons for not shutting it down.

We know you would have thought long and hard too before making this decision. Did you think of us - the community on Lively? Did you even imagine that you will have all these people rallying for a "half baked beta product" as Lively has been called by the media? That we would be willing to do whatver it takes? Well here we are.

Lively is a truly unique 3D world and I have not seen an equivalent in graphics/animation aesthetics in any other virtual world that I have seen so far. It is easy to use and has attracted people from all corners of the world. 3 months ago, I would not ever imagined that I would have a friend called Pony at Taiwan or a friend called Imajika at Florida or a friend called Cherry at the UK or a friend called Oriste at Crete or a friend called Rossen from Lebanon or... the list goes on. Lively has this unique ability to connect people from all over the world from the simple uncomplicated rooms.

To be honest, when I first tried Lively after having tried Second Life for some time, I was disappointed. Lively wouldnt let me add content or create objects. The mouse movements were different from SL. etc. But then I tried it once again - and then once more...and I am glad I did.

From what I have read on blogs and news sites about Lively - most people tried it only once and gave up OR they had never heard about it at all !! I feel strongly that Google did not give Lively the right ingredients to succeed. Not enough advertising and not opening for content development were some pitfalls that worked against Lively's success.

To justify your business, add advertisements in our rooms or make it a paid service if you like. We have several ideas that we want to send to you and will send them to you shortly. In the meantime, I want to personally appeal to you to give Lively a chance - a real chance to succeed. Make the content development public. Give us Livelyzens a chance to spread the word and get people to register. We have already started a Machinima contest (see http://livelyzens.com) for details. We value this platform and are willing to be the ambassadors of Lively. ...Just give Lively a Chance...KEEP LIVELY ALIVE !!

Sincerely,
KosmiKGuru
http://livelyzens.com

To Mel Guymon from Cherrystar

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:55:39 -0800 (PST)

To
Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.
Dear Mr. Guymon,

I found Lively on launch day...and Ive been here ever since. I hadn't used a VW before and Lively's set up some how appealed. Working through the buggy issues that seems to have deterred some early users, Lively has now become a very unique product. It has so much potential and to see it shelved after 6 months is not doing the users or the team that worked so hard to raise this project and justification at all!

Lively works in different ways for different people, never before online have I witnessed a place that encourages people to express themselves and promotes individuals creativity. This is the exact reason Lively was created, to embed in your own blog or space, a way to reach out to new people or existing friends.

There is a very strong community feel on board this site. Lively links people together under one common source, and that's conversation. It allows users to sit and talk promoting new ideas for rooms and projects. It allows ideas and themes to roll on and inspire other people and the ball continues rolling. There are some awe inspiring rooms that have been created in here from very basic inventory items. There are also some very informative rooms that bring detail on certain topics direct to the Livelyzens fingertips.

Since joining in July, I am yet to meet a Livelyzen that hasn't learned something from their time on Lively. Its a font of knowledge that can only be used to yours and us the users advantage! For starters, until I used Lively I hadn't used gmail, gtalk and other Google services. It was Lively that introduced me to the services that Google provide and currently creating. What better platform than to promote other products.

Finally as Kosmik has to rightly pointed out this is a place to meet people from far and wide, to understand and learn about their own culture, language and point of view on topics. And as a friend on here just pointed out its a place to "creating and foster very real and very sincere friendships".

Keep Lively Alive!
Sincerely,
Cherrystar

To Mel Guymon from Brittany.cda

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:21:29 -0800 (PST)

To
Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.
Dear Mr. Guymon,

I am taking this opportunity to express my sadness at the decision of Google to terminate its Lively 3D Virtual World.

I have had the pleasure of being a citizen of Lively since July 12th. During this time I have made numerous friends and look forward to my daily chats with them and others. We have shared stories and experiences. We have shared laughter and tears. All of this we have shared in what I believe to be the finest 3D community environment on the web.

As my friend Cherrystar indicated in her letter to you, it is during this period that I began to use many of the Google products including search, mail and instant messenging. The unique and fulfilling experience I have encountered in Google’s Lively has extended to your other fine products. It is this continued exposure through Lively that I believe has been a significant although unseen benefit of Lively to the Google group.

Although I imagine that your decision was not an easy one and was based on many and varied criteria, I do hope that Google would reconsider that decision.

Brittany Mansell
Calgary, Canada
http://livelyzens.com

To Mel Guymon from oriste

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:35:32 -0800 (PST)

Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Dear Mr. Guymon,

Being a non-native English speaker I can only hope to be fractionally as articulate as the previous poster. Nevertheless, I too feel compelled to address you personally today in an effort to describe to you what Lively means to me. I will do so with no other expectation than you reading my story. What you subsequently do with it, I will leave respectfully to your own discretion.

When I first participated in Lively I knew the phenomenon of virtual worlds only by reading about it. All my professional life I had been involved in "serious" Information Technology. I was a no-nonsense manager making decision based on reasoning and careful calculations. All this 3D and virtual this and that seemed pointless to me. Addictive maybe, but still pointless. A short-lived diversion for hormone-stricken teens maybe, but still pointless.

Being in semi-retirement however I figured it wouldn't harm to indulge in some frivolous exploring of this hyped "brave new virtual world". A few days in Lively turned my world upside down. It soon became addictive indeed, but no longer pointless. With quite a few hormone - stricken teens around looking for a short-lived diversion indeed, but no longer pointless.

What I found in Lively, after scratching the surface as I suspect so many industry pundits stopped short of, was a community of interesting people from all cultures and age groups that I could connect to. This didn't happen overnight, and I didn't realize this overnight either. Being an old-timer in this industry I grew up with IRC, bulletin boards and chat rooms before they were called that way. I professionally participated in forums and mailing lists. They were functional sometimes, a necessity at other times, a waste of time and energy most of the time. Not once had I felt an emotional connection. Being the obsessive analytical mind that I was trained to be, I didn't understand at first why Lively had this effect on me, why I enjoyed being in Lively.

Slowly it dawned on me: Lively is the first conversational environment that makes talking to a person feel like talking to a person. It's an enabling platform. I started investigating other virtual worlds and they all fell short. Without being blind for its shortcomings, I think that only Lively offers this characteristic. What sets it apart is that Lively offers a conversation a sense of place and person. Being able to move around a room to "physically" (as far as the avatar is concerned) join a conversation, or inversely, move away from a conversation, are extremely strong visual clues. The speech ballons help a lot in keeping focused on the participants in a conversation. With the right easy-to-adjust camera angle it's no problem to filter out other conversations in the same room. All this is only possible thanks to Google's implementation of the virtual world concept. For all the criticism that Google received for Lively's execution, this is one thing Google did right, and I thank you for it. Google managed to take the virtual world concept and turn it into the (almost) perfect chat room. Lest I offend my artistic friends in Lively, who have created beautiful works of art, beyond my imagination of what would be possible with the limited resources, I should add to my previous sentence: ... with a lot of spare room (no pun intended) for artistic expression.

You being in the position that you are, I take it you're an adult, mature, business-type alpha male, like me. Have you ever had tears welling in your eyes in a chat room, because of what someone said? Someone you only knew through his/her moniker or avatar?

I have.

Only in Lively.

Please... KEEP LIVELY ALIVE !!
Sincerely,
oriste
http://livelyzens.com

To Mel Guymon from juanpa31

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:38:02 -0800 (PST)

To
Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Dear Mr. Guymon,
mi full name is juan pablo braca. im from argentina.
i can understant the things in the world today. i see the world wild crisis. the figth agianst microsoft and understand some tipe of accions. maybe you need to consider that lively program didnt have the best managment and see the power of a tool like this..

even to take new peoples to your future projects. you only can see in the rooms to see the capability of creation in lively.

you did create a new generation of 3d chat. if you take time to enter in lively an see the kind off people you will see a kind of "protocol".
whats that??
the users are kind off worm and educate.. allways hi, welcome, thanks for coming. thinks like this... lively become in some "upotia". of how real world must be... in me. lively reborn the child i have inside. inspire my creativity and curiosity too. i understand you are a beasy man.. but maybe you need to see for your self the kind of things in lively.. i invite you to join mine and all livelyzens room.. you will see what im talking abut.

dont kill lively.. can be used for multi proposit. even to promote chrome. google are not like this.. dont work shut down... google is about to figth for your ideas.. and make it works....
like youtube.. we already are making a good campian to know lively. we just need a litle more of time the hardware and sotware is already there. give us a litle more of time and you will see.. lively will gonna lift off like a rocket..
thanks for yout time..
--------
-------
juanpa31
http://livelyzens.com/

To Mr. Mel Guymon from jenl2881

Date: Tue, 25 Nov 2008 22:59:57 -0800 (PST)

To
Mr. Mel Guymon
Head of 3D Operations
Google Inc.

Dear Mr. Guymon,

My letter is concerning the imminent shutdown of Lively, which is set to occur on December 31, 2008.

You could say I come from a generation of techies. The majority of my life it seems has been spent on the internet or on a gaming console. Some might see this as a negative fact, but I would stand by the contrary. Without ever leaving the country I have dipped into the diversity and culture of a world I would never have known existed if not for sites like Lively. Lively is, however, by far the most capable I have ever seen an online chat site of bringing together the creative, the logical, the culturally diverse, and the most amazing people I have ever met in my lifetime.

Through Lively I have acquired new friendships and an amazing network of contacts. Shane and Tanya are artists from Michigan and Montana. Skip is an incredible programmer with a skill for 3D creations. Ross is always a good laugh but also a wonderful artist. Count is a composer from Romania, Lively lives in Australia, Deb is my good friend from Argentina, Squeak is an artist from Seattle with amazing talent, and KosmikGuru is creative and a born leader. There’s also Ammy who is a from my state, Texas, and a great friend, Queen Bee works with plants, and Luis and Monih both speak Portuguese (they’ve taught me Boa Noite which means good evening or good night). I have made some great friends and met some wonderful people.

Lively is more than just avatars, 3D rooms, and chat. It’s a place where people of different cultures, location, and histories come together to learn and grow from one another. Lively is like a community, a town. The Sims couldn’t come close the what Lively has become. The characters, who seem alive half the time, are better created and far more unique than any Sim character I have ever seen. Taking away Lively is like taking away a home and a family.

I know that sometimes I have been unhappy on Lively. Does that mean I want it to go away, no. A speaker came to my school a while back to talk about Google search. He told us he was the product manager of search. He explained the history of search, Google’s mission, and some facts to us. I also had lunch with him and some faculty afterward. He spoke about how while all the other companies went with one way of searching Google took a different approach. Microsoft scoffed at the idea. Google is now a leading name in search and is almost untouchable. Why then is Google giving up on something that has a chance to be their next big break-through?

I understand there are bottom lines, shareholders to satisfy, and a bleak economic projection. Yet even in these hard times, the gaming industry is booming. EA is making millions with games like The Sims and some games are projected to be almost impossible to find. Hugely popular are MMORPGs like World of War Craft and even sites like Neopets.com are moving into interactive 3D content with their Petpetpark.com. Lively has a huge potential for success. It’s differentiated by its style and ease of use, you’ve already invested variable and fixed costs into it you are unlikely to see returned, and it can create a stronger image for Google. As well, you have the potential for contracts with console companies like Nintendo, cell phone companies like Sprint, and social networking sites like Facebook.

Please know that there are many people who have their creativity, time, and lives invested into Lively. Regardless of the outcome, I thank you for this amazing site where I have met the most amazing people. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Sincerely,

Jen
Jenl2881

To Mr. Mel Guymon from Xavier

Date: Wed, 26 Nov 2008 02:45:26 -0800 (PST)

When I first joined Lively it was simply out of curiosity to see what a Virtual World was all about. I'd previously been rather sceptical about the whole VW scene, as I thought this in general was mostly a playground for horny teenagers and computer geeks. My main reason for trying out Lively was the Google label, as I considered - and still do consider - Google as a mature and decent company and that a Google approval would keep this VW "cleaner" than other VW sites.

I'm happy to say that my expectations were fullfilled, and even more so. I've made many new friends from different countries, and I know that they all are as satisfied as I am that Lively showed itself to be a family-friendly and clean site. In addition to that, Lively has very low entrance barriers and can be used by everyone with any interest in making new friends - without any need for training or computer proficiency.

Other users have their own reasons to appeal for Lively's survival - a.o. the unique possibility for artistical creativity within a VW framework. We have all our reasons to ask for Google to keep up their image as a responsible company. My Lively friends are all intelligent and serious people who deserve both Google's respect and to be heard through their appeals. I join their united voice in this appeal to Google to do the correct thing - Let Lively Live !!

Xavier