The Google team is comparing 'Lively', a new online persistent virtual world which launched this week, to the extremely popular 3D virtual world, Second Life.

Google Lively is billed as a "chat experience" using avatars. Google says about it,

"You're about to embark on a chat experience in which you can communicate and express yourself using avatars in your very own space. Choose an avatar and use it to make friends and chat. Create rooms, decorate them to your liking, and make sure to invite your friends over."

Lively supports Windows XP and Vista via the Firefox or Internet Explorer browsers and requires a Google ID in order to sign up. It's currently in its beta phase, so users may still experience issues.

Lively has a long way to go if it hopes to catch up Second Life, which currently has its own economy, virtual trading and has frequently been under the media spotlight, not always for positive reasons. You may have heard about the two users who conducted a virtual marriage ceremony , cheating on their real-life partners in the process. Or, you may have read about the accusations that some members were allegedly trading child pornography and creating sexually-themed avatars.

Virtual chat worlds aren't nice places for your kids folks, but we can't stop you. If you fancy it, you can download Lively from the official website.