Coca-Cola officially entered Second Life issuing an invitation to avatars as well as the general public to submit ideas for a portable virtual vending machine, according to MediaPost.

The design competition invites people to submit designs to virtualthirst.com for a chance to win a grand prize of building and launching the ultimate vending machine with the help of 3-D design shop Millions of Us. Design entries will be accepted through a variety of formats and submission methods, including submissions within Second Life, YouTube and MySpace.

Coke's initiation into Second Life was spearheaded by new marketing consultancy crayon, which devised the strategy for the soft drink marketer and helped it tap an advisory council made up of Second Life residents and designers which will select the winner of the competition.

Michael Donnelly, Coke's director of global interactive marketing said the Virtual Thirst platform is something that could be extended into offline media and moreover, into portable media games, wireless and other emerging platforms. The concept could eventually tie into or complement Coke's current campaign "The Coke Side of Life." He characterized the Second Life play as a learning experience.