Although you can't actually drink a Coke while playing Second Life, you can have the essence of a Coke. At least that's the thinking behind the virtual campaign for the beverage maker, which offers Second Life users a contest to design a vending machine that dispenses the essence of Coke, according to a report from MediaPost.

In conjunction with Joe Jaffe's crayon agency, Coke has launched Virtual Thirst as its first foray into Second Life.

The contest, which is open to the general public as well as Second Life avatars, opens the doors to Coke drinkers to tell the company what they believe is the essence of the popular soda.

"Our goal is to enable individual creativity in pursuit of a 'vending' machine that can exist only in your wildest imagination," Michael Donnelly, director of global interactive marketing for Coke, told MediaPost.

While Coke said it hopes to see strong results from its presence in Second Life, the company acknowledges that the virtual campaign is an experiment.

"Our advice was to start small and then build conversation around the small idea," Jaffe said. "That's the long tail of creativity. This is less about a Second Life project and more about being able to take the whole concept of thirst and position it as a thirst for meaning, knowledge, love, self-expression and a thirst for an experience."

In July, Coke launched "The Coke Side of Life Campaign," in an online effort to redefine its global marketing platform.