Google today has launched a new service named Lively. Google Lively provides users interactive avatars on top of the Google Talk (GTalk) instant messaging platform.

Lively works through a browser plug-in that is currently only available for Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox on Microsoft Windows. The Lively browser plug-in allows the service to be embedded directly into web pages.

Second Life and other such competing services might be in for a tough time – although in its current form Google Lively doesn’t consist of a single world, each room is individually created by a user, so for now virtual worlds with a central world aren’t direct competition. It does seem very feasible that future iterations of Google Lively will have a central world where users can interact.

I find this a strange service to be released by Google considering their mission statement:
“Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.”

What does this have to do with organizing the world’s information? Is Google diversifying into markets too far out of its core business?

You could argue this is just an interactive attachment to Google Talk, which it is, but isn’t going a little too far?

I think the advertising dollars is what is attracting Google to this sector, maybe it’s time to change their mission statement: “Google’s mission is to cover every surface in the world with advertising.”