Lively: 3D Chat by Google

Lively is a unique 3D chat experience by Google, 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 runs inside the browser but needs a Windows installation first to work.
Visit the site to know more and download the application.

Google, IBM promote 'cloud' computing at universities

Google Inc. and IBM have teamed up to offer a curriculum and support for software development on large-scale distributed computing systems, with six universities signing up so far.

The program is designed to help students and researchers get experience working on Internet-scale applications, the companies said. The relatively new form of parallel computing, sometimes called cloud computing, hasn't yet caught on in university settings.

BM and Google have dedicated a cluster of several hundred computers -- including PCs donated by Google and IBM BladeCenter servers -- and the companies expect the cluster to grow to more than 1,600 processors.

The companies call these clusters "cloud" computing. A cloud is a collection of machines that can serve as a host for a variety of applications, including interactive Web 2.0 applications. Clouds support a broader set of applications than do traditional computing grids, because they allow various kinds of middleware to be hosted on virtual machines distributed across the cloud.

Visit IBM for more details.