JenniCam Celebrates 4-Year Anniversary

Grats by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 18:39 · Score: 1

Without a doubt my favorite slashbox :)

The great thing about Jennicam in a way is the time difference, I'm in the UK, so I get to see Jenni in bed for most of the day

*puurrr*

Re:WTF??? by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 18:52 · Score: 1

If you really need it explained that it's defined as
internet culture, and therefore of geek-interest,
then perhaps you really don't belong here.

JenniCam automatic downloader by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 19:00 · Score: 1

/*
* Jennicam fetcher. Requires curl. Known to compile and run under that
* *evil* operating system. Grabs latest pic every
* 15 minutes and writes HTML file with all pictures
*/
#include <windows.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stddef.h>
#include <process.h>
#include <time.h>

int fetchPic( char *fname );

int main( void )
{
time_t t,t2;
struct tm *tm;
static char fname[256];

while( TRUE )
{
// generate filename
t = time( NULL );
tm = localtime( &t );

wsprintf( fname, "jennicam-%04d%02d%02d%02d%02d.jpg",
tm->tm_year+1900, tm->tm_mon+1, tm->tm_mday, tm->tm_hour,
tm->tm_min );
fetchPic( fname );
writeHtml( fname, t );

t += ( 15 * 60 );
t2 = time( NULL );

tm = localtime( &t );
printf( "Sleeping until %02d:%02d:%02d...\n\n", tm->tm_hour,
tm->tm_min, tm->tm_sec );
if ( t > t2 )
SleepEx( ( t - t2 ) * 1000, FALSE );
//SleepEx( 14 * 1000, FALSE );
}

return 0;
}

int fetchPic( char *fname )
{
char buf[256];
printf( "Executing curl: %s\n", fname );
spawnl( P_WAIT, "curl", "curl", "-o", fname, "http://www.jennicam.org/guests/cam.jpg", NULL );
printf( "curl finished...\n" );
return 0;
}

int writeHtml( char *fname, time_t t )
{
FILE *fp;
char buf[256];
long int currPos;
BOOL done = FALSE;
char insline[] = "";

fp = fopen( "jennicam.html", "r+t" );
if ( fp == NULL )
{
fp = fopen( "jennicam.html", "wt" );
if ( fp == NULL )
return 0;
fprintf( fp, "<HTML>\n<HEAD>\n<TITLE>JenniCam Captured Pics</TITLE>\n" );
fprintf( fp, "</HEAD>\n<BODY>\n" );
}
else
{
// seek to the spot where we want to insert another image
while( !feof( fp ) && !done )
{
currPos = ftell( fp );
fgets( buf, 256, fp );
if ( !strncmp( insline, buf, lstrlen(insline) ) )
{
fseek( fp, currPos, SEEK_SET );
done = TRUE;
}
}
if ( !done )
{
printf( "did not find insert line... :-(\n" );
return 0;
}
}

strcpy( buf, ctime( &t ) );
buf[lstrlen(buf)-1] = '\0';
fprintf( fp, " Picture captured at: %s<br>\n", buf );
fprintf( fp, " <img src=\"%s\"><br><br><hr><br>\n", fname );
fprintf( fp, "%s\n", insline );
fprintf( fp, "</BODY>\n</HTML>\n" );

fclose( fp );
return 0;
}

Re:JenniCam automatic downloader by CerebusUS · 2000-04-13 23:40 · Score: 1

Or you could grab a copy of wget and write the following in perl (whatever happened to reduce, reuse, recycle? :-) Note that this is written for registered users, thus the username and password fields.

$output = qx( "wget --http-user=username --http-passwd=passwd http://www.jennicam.org/~jenni/livecam/cam.jpg");

($MINUTE, $HOUR, $DAY, $MONTH, $YEAR) = (localtime)[1, 2, 3, 4, 5];
$MONTH = $MONTH +1;
$YEAR = $YEAR + 1900;

if ( $MONTH < 10 ) {$MONTH = "0" . $MONTH};
if ( $DAY < 10 ) {$DAY = "0" . $DAY};
if ( $HOUR < 10 ) {$HOUR = "0" . $HOUR};
if ( $MINUTE < 10 ) {$MINUTE = "0" . $MINUTE};

$TIME = $YEAR . "-" . $MONTH . "-" . $DAY . "-" . $HOUR . $MINUTE;

if ($HOUR < 6) {$SEG = "0-Midnight\-to\-6AM"};
if (($HOUR > 5) && ($HOUR < 12)) {$SEG = "1-6AM\-to\-Noon"};
if (($HOUR > 11) && ($HOUR < 18)) {$SEG = "2-Noon\-to\-6PM"};
if ($HOUR > 17) {$SEG = "3-6PM\-to\-Midnight"};

$DATE = $YEAR . "-" . $MONTH . "-" . $DAY . "-" . $SEG;

$output = qx( "md $DATE");
$output = qx( "copy cam.jpg $DATE\\Jenni-$TIME.jpg");
$output = qx( "del cam.jpg ");

sleep(59);

I also wrote some simple perl to create index pages for it, but you can probably do that on your own.

Re:JenniCam - what's in it for me. by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-14 08:36 · Score: 1

> She also does yoga, pets her cats, hacks on her PCs, watches South Park...

yeah that's right she hacks on her PCs. just the other day I looked at jennicam and she was rebuilding her computer's linux kernel. I also heard her skills were integral to the effort to port NetBSD to the StrongARM processor.

I never understood the whole concept by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 18:53 · Score: 2

Could someone explain the attraction to JenniCam (sans nudity) and other things like MTV's 'Real World' and some recent show on ABC? Personally I find it extremely painful to sit around in a room listening to peoples personal relationship problems, or to sit in a room watching someone cut their toenails and pretend I'm not there. For most people the idea of sitting around doing nothing but listening to people bitch and moan is boring, so what do they do? They turn on the TV and watch people do it.

The whole JenniCam thing is pretty sick. I can understand if you watch to see if she gets naked, but you might as well just go out and rent a porn tape because the picture quality is much better. The losers who say they don't watch JenniCam for the sex are either liars, or they are those pathetic people who are so lacking in self-esteem that they have to lurk around people to feel some sense of self-worth; you know, potential stalkers.

Re:I never understood the whole concept by ronfar · 2000-04-13 20:05 · Score: 2

The whole JenniCam thing is pretty sick. I can understand if you watch to see if she gets naked, but you might as well just go out and rent a porn tape because the picture quality is much better. The losers who say they don't watch JenniCam for the sex are either liars, or they are those pathetic people who are so lacking in self-esteem that they have to lurk around people to feel some sense of self-worth; you know, potential stalkers.
This is interesting, because I think it gets to the heart of why Jennicam is an interesting idea (I've only been to the site once myself, got bored and didn't stick around.) I mean, this person is upset at the idea that Jennicam might not be about sex.
Jennicam let's us all be Jimmy Stuart in Rear Window, in that movie, the disturbing thing wasn't just the murder, it was Jimmy Stuart in his wheelchair watching all the other people's lives and watching them. Watching the sad parts of their lives and the happy ones with a coldly judgemental voyeurs eyes...
Of course, if you want judgemental voyeurs, looks like Slashdot is the place to get them! ^_^

--
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Re:I never understood the whole concept by cyberroach · 2000-04-13 20:50 · Score: 1

Believe it or not, the biggest appeal for me is that Jenni works from home. I do not work from home. I work in a large office building at a little workstation. There's something very appealing about sitting at my desk at work and being able to watch "through the looking glass" as someone lounges around in there PJs 'til 11 or 12. Or goes wandering outside all afternoon on a nice day.

On a wider level...

I think there are two classes of voyerism: There's the "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous"/Pornstar Home Movie type of stuff that deals with people getting to see all the things they WISH they had in their life. This makes us feel small and unimportant.

And then there are things like Jennicam and "the Sims" that reassure us that yes, our lives are pretty normal and that's ok. Jennicam is especially intersting for male nerds that don't get much interaction with the females of the species... it difuses some of the mystery of a person when you realize that they sometimes stay up 'til 2am stuffing themselves with junkfood and playing video games too. But since it is simply "a life... on the web" there is something for everyone in it. As much as people may try to tell us otherwise, "a life" is something we all have.

Re:Well, good for her. by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 19:32 · Score: 2

it seems like a lot of people are missing the point of Jennicam. What she is doing is in no way porn, as her sex life doesn't get more emphasis in the images than her desire for cheese sandwiches. what might make it porn is the viewer's voyeristic interest, but that is up to you to create. the site is a darn fine piece of art. not 'cause the design of the site is "pretty", but because she's taken a straightforward idea to extremes and rocked some people's boats pretty effectively with it. A lot of /.ers seem to have had their boats well and truly capsized. "porn" & "obscene" & "jollies"... Christ almighty, get over it. Instead think about it in terms of space. She has left a window perpetually open on what she does, so where does she keep her privacy? and how does that window give anyone the right to judge or include themselves in her sex life?

Cock Tease cams by Anonymous Coward · 2000-04-13 18:52 · Score: 4

It's amazing how many of these chick cam sites there are. Practically ALL of them make you pay, and there's always the "oops I forgot to wear any clothes!" shots, the "I just got out of the shower" shots, the "I'm gonna mess around with my boyfriend who's not ever going to be you!" shots, all with a stupid disclaimer of that they want every minute of their life to be on the cam, whether it's naked time or not.

Let's face it, an attractive woman who sits around the house all day for a for-pay webcam is a quick profit. She is profiting off of horny lonely men, and will not give out any refunds(a drunk friend of mine signed up for jennicam, and refused to give him a refund).

i predict these webcams will stay popular until one evening a crazed stalker enters the home and rapes/kills her for EVERYONE(including the guest cam) to see. The media will get wind of it(since all men on the internet are creepy in the media's eyes), and all of these cams will thank god shut down overnight.

Re:Cock Tease cams by TrentC · 2000-04-13 21:35 · Score: 1

Let's face it, an attractive woman who sits around the house all day for a for-pay webcam is a quick profit.

...Except according to her and her journal, she's not making a lot of profit. She's commented many times that if more people actually signed up as members, she'd have the money to do some really cool stuff. I remember her discussing the move from 30-min refresh/2-min-for-members to 15 and 1, trying to see if the increase in bandwidth usage would break her or not.

Most of her hardware (including her laptop) is actually donated to her by fans. As for her bed selling on eBay for $2800? Well, she said she paid over $3000 for it, so hawking her stuff hasn't been too lucrative either.

She is profiting off of horny lonely men, and will not give out any refunds(a drunk friend of mine signed up for jennicam, and refused to give him a refund).

Funny, I'm not lonely -- I proposed to my fiancee back in November, yet I still resubscribed to Jenni last month. Trust me, if I'm horny, I don't need to go to a website to get my rocks off.

Besides, in the last year, I've actually seen her having sex maybe 4 times, 5 times tops. That's a piss-poor average for a "porn site".

i predict these webcams will stay popular until one evening a crazed stalker enters the home and rapes/kills her for EVERYONE (including the guest cam) to see.

Fortunately, Jenni seems to have enough sense to take reasonable precautions to protect herself.

Jay (=
Re:Cock Tease cams by akey · 2000-04-13 20:36 · Score: 2

Drunk men waste far more than $15.00 just ordering drinks. Ever been sitting at a bar and go to pay for that one last drink and sit there intently trying to count those one dollar bills in your pocket, hoping not to get it wrong, then just say "fuck it" and pile the entire mess on the table and ask the bartender to keep em coming until you run out? Just losing $15.00 on a binge should be considered a fortunate fate!

Actually, drunk men used to end up enlisted in the Army. I'd just take the $15, write it off, and remember that far worse things can happen...

--

---
"Go Metallica. Die RIAA." -- Linus Torvalds
Re:Cock Tease cams by weave · 2000-04-13 19:53 · Score: 3

Let's face it, an attractive woman who sits around the house all day for a for-pay webcam is a quick profit. She is profiting off of horny lonely men, and will not give out any refunds(a drunk friend of mine signed up for jennicam, and refused to give him a refund).

No refund? Of what, $15.00 for a year of one-minute peeks instead of once every 15? That's something to get upset about?! :)
Drunk men waste far more than $15.00 just ordering drinks. Ever been sitting at a bar and go to pay for that one last drink and sit there intently trying to count those one dollar bills in your pocket, hoping not to get it wrong, then just say "fuck it" and pile the entire mess on the table and ask the bartender to keep em coming until you run out? Just losing $15.00 on a binge should be considered a fortunate fate!
Re:Cock Tease cams by Camel+Pilot · 2000-04-13 20:44 · Score: 2

She is profiting off of horny lonely men, and will not give out any refunds(a drunk friend of mine signed up for jennicam, and refused to give him a refund).

Don't get mad get even. Have your druken freind do the same thing the Cookie lady did and publish the password right here on /. :)
Re:Cock Tease cams by Crispin+Glover · 2000-04-13 23:36 · Score: 4

I've said before and I'll say it again. If Jenni would get a 20ish model/student/might-be-lesbian roommate, I might actually subscribe.

ways to waste $15.00 by mosch · 2000-04-14 00:59 · Score: 2

One pint of good Belgian Ale
One CD
9 gallons of gas in the US
A third of a technical book
3 weeks of dial-up internet access
1 week of web hosting with 200 megs of space
15 blank cdrs
2 sapphire and tonics, with tip

I think I made my point, $15 is pretty much nothing unless you're a starving college student, and even then, it's just two cases of horridly cheap beer, or one mag of really bad vodka.

----------------------------

Ewww . . . by LoCoPuff · 2000-04-14 07:03 · Score: 1

You guys like that ?

I mean . .sure it's cool about that Internet/Camera/Privacy thing . .but damn . .

She's NOT ALL THAT . . . I've brushed off women 10 times cutier and finer than that !

Come on . . PLEASE don't tell me you think she's hott. . . CRUSH or NOT !

huh? by crayz · 2000-04-13 23:01 · Score: 1

Moderation Totals:Offtopic=2, Funny=2, Total=4.

And the score was 3. How does that work?

Re:Huh? by GoofyBoy · 2000-04-13 19:01 · Score: 1

>Then you've dodged the media pretty deftly

I wish.

I got the full blunt of the Elian, Princess Diana, JFK Jr., etc crap. I don't even watch the news. :(

--
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Re:Huh? by Calamari+Indigo · 2000-04-13 20:58 · Score: 1

This would be in America, no?
Not all of us live in America.
Re:Huh? by jbarnett · 2000-04-13 19:16 · Score: 1

JenniCam is THE BEST SlashBox of all times man.

--

"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -THHGTTG
Re:Huh? by Stary · 2000-04-14 01:53 · Score: 1

Yeah, some of us are lucky enough not to.
Well sure I knew about jennicam, but I sure as hell didnt see it on the news. Pretty weird actually... I'm used to seeing news on the news. Oh well...

--
Tomorrow will be cancelled due to lack of interest
Re:Huh? by h_jurvanen · 2000-04-13 19:08 · Score: 3

What? I never even heard of her and her cam until this article.
Jenni's been on Letterman. Since the media-savvy intelligentsia recongizes Letterman as the metric of who has made it or not, it is now officially you who is behind the times.[1]
And, I'm surprised that nobody has brought up the fact that JenniCam can be had as a Slashbox!!
Herbie J.
[1] Just kidding, of course, although she has been on Letterman. And I don't want to hear any guff about "what is Letterman???" If I can get it here in Finland...

Check Out an Original LINUX Cam by mholve · 2000-04-14 01:10 · Score: 2

That's cool, I guess... If you have nothing better to do than watch Jenni gain weight.

I started one of the first Linux cams way back when the Connectix first came out. It's still up today, years later. Instructions on how to do it, etc.

Check it out.

Re:Not JenniCam(quite humurous): by Per+Abrahamsen · 2000-04-13 20:01 · Score: 1

They had their own posting some time ago.

Oh very brave moderating me down. by fialar · 2000-04-13 19:46 · Score: 1

Moderator: get a life and realize that people have every right to voice their opinions.

Re:Oh very brave moderating me down. by GoofyBoy · 2000-04-13 19:59 · Score: 1

I agree with you. You asked an honest question and they marked you down as a troll.

Crappy moderation.

--
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.

Slashdot has always been about quirk by ry4an · 2000-04-13 19:03 · Score: 1

Slashdot has always had a healthy mix of tech news and connected quirk. If it loses its sense of humor, it'll just be ZDNet (without the evil).

www.anonymizer.com is for you! by zipwow · 2000-04-13 21:33 · Score: 1

anonymizer.com works well for avoiding those silly firewalls. Or, if it is blocked as well, there are other sites that you can usually find via a search.

Firewall blocking is a waste of time, imho.

Zipwow

--
I don't know which is more depressing, that 2/3 didn't care enough to vote, or that 1/2 of those that did are crazy.

Re:www.anonymizer.com is for you! by DjDanny · 2000-04-16 14:29 · Score: 1

I wish it was for me! Sadly, the site "anonymizer.com" is ALSO blocked! back to the drawing board I reckon!

How dose she do it ? by Forge · 2000-04-13 18:54 · Score: 1

I get antsy just having a few people peep through my window. I had a netcam and turned it off to avoid being seen so much.

Jenny on the other hand is on display 24/7 for the whole world. You can watch her eat sleep hack or just plain live. I don't think I could handle the pressure. Then again, maybe I am just not as pretty as Jenny. Not that she is particularly hot or anything. In fact the only thing unusual about her is that you get to see how she lives.

What a difference the cam makes.

--
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?

Re:How dose she do it ? by vyesue · 2000-04-14 05:16 · Score: 2

Particularly hot? For god's sake, people, this girl is a cow. Please, for your own good, get out of your houses once in a while.

A cow ? I woldn't know. by Forge · 2000-04-14 08:51 · Score: 1

I'm not very good at judging the reletive buty of white women because I havn't seen that many who I find attractive and I don't know how much of that is just a subconsius racial bias.

I can however recognise a few that I consider very hot. The girl from "Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human" is hot. Trinity is hot. Anything below 1st rate hot, I just don't categorise.

--
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?

Hear, hear... by acb · 2000-04-13 21:14 · Score: 1

It's sad that a lot of people condemn JenniCam as being some sort of porn for perverts in denial or something. Most of them seem to be acting on secondhand knowledge, having heard some stories about a girl who gets naked on camera for all the world to see. If they read her journals, &c., which she posts online, or looked at the images a few times, they'd know that this is not about n3kkid l4diez.

JenniCam is more about intimacy than sex. In many places you can go to see a woman get naked; there are plenty of porn sites which fill that demand. What Jenni does is let the viewer into her life, in honest, intimate detail; and that her life is just a normal life, not the exploits of a porn star or anysuch.

(Of course, that she's pretty cute also helps her traffic, no doubt. Though I doubt that much of the traffic is from the dirty-raincoat brigade, who wouldn't waste their time watching a fully clothed woman typing or folding her laundry or whatever when there are actual porn sites for them to visit.)

Re:1st cyberstar by acb · 2000-04-13 21:16 · Score: 2

First photogenic cyberstar, maybe; or first pretty girl you can look at as you read her diary. There have been other virtual celebrities before Jenni, and even before the Web (such as Kibo, for example), though they were mostly textual and didn't get quite that amount of media attention.

Re:Maybe A Little Background Would Help? by acb · 2000-04-13 21:21 · Score: 2

Jenni's "infamous BDSM pages"? The mind boggles...

Re:1st cyberstar by acb · 2000-04-15 18:01 · Score: 2

Was Cindy Margolis on the Internet, and known there, before Kibo? I don't think so. Somehow, I can't imagine her taking part in USENET life using rn on a shared UNIX machine in 1991 or so...

Re:you gets what you asks for by Mr.+Neutron · 2000-04-13 18:53 · Score: 1

I agree with this post.

Although, the moderation system will assure that only the most interesting, informative, insightful, and funny obscene garbage and spam will float to the top of the heap. :-)

--

--
dinner: it's what's for beer

"Big Brother" by Pseudonymus+Bosch · 2000-04-13 20:54 · Score: 1

Could somebody confirm that audience for the German show has been decreasing since the splash 1st emmission?

But it's being licensed accross Europe.
__

--
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu

Re:"Big Brother" by sanderb · 2000-04-13 20:58 · Score: 1

Could somebody confirm that audience for the German show has been decreasing since the splash 1st emmission?
But it's being licensed accross Europe.
I am not sure what you mean, but if you mean 'why bring it out all over Europe if it ain't popular', the answer is it was a huge hit in the Netherlands, the first country to show it.

Yeah, sure by Pseudonymus+Bosch · 2000-04-13 22:36 · Score: 1

And you browse Playboy.com with Lynx, sure.
__

--
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu

Re:Yeah, sure by TheCarp · 2000-04-14 00:04 · Score: 1

Actually I don't browse playboy.com....I mean
I have once or twice, but not often.

Come on...the Articles in Playboy ARE good.
Sure, thats never been my motivation in buying
the magazine...but after giving the pictures
a good eye over (and the meat a good pounding)
the Articles do make a good read.

--
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"

1st cyberstar by Pseudonymus+Bosch · 2000-04-13 20:57 · Score: 5

JenniCam is newsworthy because, as Salon (?) said she is the first cyberstar. See, whatever star you can think of, Ronaldo, Pamela, Clinton, Gates, Torvalds and Tux (not that good example), the Pope, they are popular in the net and outside of the net. Their fame was enhanced by the net, but Jenni was created by the Internet.
It showed that you could be a mere student and get worldwide famous, a dedicate followership, even alt.fans.jennicam and only by some pieces of networked hardware.

It couldn't happen before the net.

Besides, it's the only webcam available as a Slashbox.
(What about some statistics about Slashboxes people choose?)

But yes, 4th anniversary is not that exciting.
__

--
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu

Re:1st cyberstar by Uart · 2000-04-15 02:18 · Score: 1

ehem, Cindy Margolis, ehem

nuff said

--

Opinionated Law Student Strikes Again!
Re:1st cyberstar by CrazyJoel · 2000-04-14 02:23 · Score: 1

So, Jenni is really a proto-Angie Mitchell.

--

Such is the infinite Grace of Popeye.

JenniCam IPO by Bishop · 2000-04-13 20:24 · Score: 2

So when is the JeniCam IPO? As one of the few web sites that actually make money it is past due.

Re:And it celebrates its anniversary by... by Nicolas+MONNET · 2000-04-13 19:09 · Score: 1

Ghasp!!! I jumped on the link as I thought you wrote going down.

Nevermind ...

Feeling old. by Nicolas+MONNET · 2000-04-13 19:14 · Score: 2

Indeed, that feels so old. I remember the pre-cam Jenni pages, I did'nt remember that was so old. I remember that, when I saw it, I said to myself: wow, she's very exhibitionnist. Duh!

Back in the day by marquis · 2000-04-13 21:15 · Score: 1

I've been bragging for years that I knew Jennifer back when she was a student at Dickinson College. I think it was autumn of 1995 and I had just discovered The Internettm. I'd heard you could see naked pictures and stuff so, clever fellow that I am, I did a search on Lycos for "breasts" (OK, and other stuff). I stumbled across a site by Jennifer Kaye Ringley which included (amongst a plethora of fascinating items) a "Tour of Jennifer's Body". This included closeups of almost every body part: hair, back, hands, feet, BREASTS(!), arms, neck, butt, etc etc. Jennifer wrote informative, entertaining blurbs for each of the body parts. I was struck by her humor and strong sense of herself. I just HAD to email her and we ended up exchanging email for a couple of months. I turned her on to Jackson Browne and she turned me on to Poe's (Edgar Allen, that is) Annabel Lee.

The point is this woman is anything but some money-grubbing whatever. She is a clever early-adopter who figured out a way to let her hobby pay for itself and then some.

Re:You know that you are bored when... by unitron · 2000-04-14 12:48 · Score: 1

Shall I come back in 4 more days to post another reply?

--

I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

Re:Not geek news, what?? by unitron · 2000-04-14 13:56 · Score: 1

She might get credit for lodging in the subconcious of some hollywood type and making him/her think that it was their idea to make the movie, but one of them (forget which)was based on a sci-fi short story older than Jenni.

--

I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

Re:You know that you are bored when... by unitron · 2000-04-18 10:31 · Score: 1

Okay, it's been 5 days.

--

I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

Re:You know that you are bored when... by unitron · 2000-04-18 17:29 · Score: 1

You better hope nobody else sees that post :-)

--

I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

Re:You know that you are bored when... by unitron · 2000-04-19 05:40 · Score: 1

"Well, the risk of anyone reading a /. post older than a day is rather slim, don't you think?"
Unless you're in a running battle with a sig nazi :-)

--

I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

Jennicam Activity Meter by szyzyg · 2000-04-13 19:46 · Score: 2

I'ma amazed my dead activity meter page still gets more hits than anything else on my web pages (welll except for liveice now).

It was a silly use of image analysis to figure out just what was going on, I never quite got round to implementing an automatic Jenni-Alert for users.

Still this whole automatic download/image analysis did one thing original.... I remember SGI claiming a patent for a random numbver generator based on a camera pointed at a Lava Lamp.... well I used the jenni images for random number generation and occasionally - this featured a lava lamp.

So... anyone wanting to challenge this patent can talk to me for 'prior art' ;-)

Interesting by tilly · 2000-04-13 19:02 · Score: 2

The first time I heard about her was a little over a year ago when she was running in some poll against Linus Torvalds. I saw it here and said, "Huh?"

I find it amusing that the number times I run into mentions of her is about as often as she shows up on /., which it to say "not much".

Cheers,
Ben

--
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht

Re:A little self-indulgent nostalgia by llywrch · 2000-04-14 05:42 · Score: 2

David, I'm glad you shared your thoughts about Jenni here. Especially after seeing all of these posters who seem to have a madonna/slut attitude towards women.

I remember her from the early days of the Web, when everyone was trying to figure out how to use this new medium. Lots of the ideas were clearly crap, but there were a few that got lost in the corporate rush into the 'Net.

Jenni came up with a simple & obvious idea (which Bezos & Co. would have patented), which in the spirit of the time was more cinema verite than voyeurism. It was a peek into someone else's world -- which was what the Internet was all about then. Yes, she was doing it in part for the sexual turn-on, but we are all sexual creatures -- at least in part.

Now instead of people talking to each other & learning about each other, the trendy thing to do with the Internet is to make money -- in any new way one can think of. Maybe the posters who think she runs a pay-for-a-peek site are right in a way: that's all anyone expect you to do with a web cam anymore.

A little innocence has been lost.

Geoff

--
I think I see a trend here. Maybe for them it really would be easier to muzzle the entire internet than to produce p

Re:Lies,lies,lies by orabidoo · 2000-04-13 20:44 · Score: 2

huh? quit lying to ourselves? I don't need to lie to myself to say I'm not interested in Jennicam. I remember back in 97 or so when it became sort of known, and sure, I went and looked at the page, maybe 5 times across a couple of weeks. then I just forgot about it, because it's just not that interesting, really.

I respect Jenni as a (probably) intelligent human being who made something of her life and had an impact. But I DON'T respect Jennicam, nor the bigger picture that it stands for, which is to use other people's dull lives as entertainment. Not for moral reasons, she's not "selling herself" anymore than a TV actor is, anyway. My opinion of Jennicam is more or less the same as my opinion of soap operas on TV. Pure meaningless time-filling dumb entertainment. Which is fine as a guilty pleasure if you take it like that, but in terms of "how worthwhile it is for you", it's really very near the bottom of it all.

Re:Lies,lies,lies by orabidoo · 2000-04-16 22:28 · Score: 2

what am I doing answering to an old thread on /., as if anyone read those... anyway :) yeah, you get the idea. I don't criticize anyone individually; I think Jenni is to be admired for what she has done and for the strength it must have required of her, and for making the point that a life voluntarily with no privacy *is* possible and thinkable. and I respect the people who go to the site, because, well, who am I to criticize them, as if I didn't waste time too with other things that are quite worthless too. it's only in the larger cultural picture that I criticize Jennicam, in the same way that I pretty much despise most of what's on TV.

1986 by kritanus · 2000-04-13 18:53 · Score: 2

So what are the consequences of Jenni-Cam and alike? I also watched Jennicam a few times until a TV-Show came up here (germany) called Big Brother.
In this show you can watch a couple of people who are isolated in a house (at their own will) and every week one of them is elected to leave. The last one gets o lot of money. As this show came up I was somehow shocked. Ok, I know there are enough idiots who want to be in tv at any price, but think of the consequences. It supports the tollerance of being watched. Things like this
risk our privacey on a long term basis.

Re:1986 by fReNeTiK · 2000-04-13 19:36 · Score: 1

Long live Slatko "the brain"! (Have you seen him in TV Total? He won, and will be back next week, arrgh!)

[moderators: If you don't get it, don't moderate]

--
I strongly believe that trying to be clever is detrimental to your health. -- Linus Torvalds

Privacy issues by Gepard · 2000-04-13 21:56 · Score: 4

Warning: Flamebait material ahead.

I am, as usual, stunned at Slashdot. These are the people who are privacy freaks, I mean a lot of people here are all for encrypting every little byte of data on their drives. The sheer number of venomous comments directed at ``Big Brother,'' the CIA, the NSA, the DIA, Congress, corporations, or whatever else Jon Katz decided ``threatens geekdom'' leaves me amazed.

But a lot of people are huge fans of JenniCam! Seems like a huge privacy violation. Granted she's doing it voluntarily, but still---we never want anyone spying on out private lives, no sir, absolutely not! But spying on other people's lives? Hehe. Sounds like fun, to all the voyerism fetishists in this audience. Everyone else's privacy can go to hell.

Re:Privacy issues by Randym · 2000-04-14 03:19 · Score: 2

Granted she's doing it voluntarily
Well, then it's *not* a privacy violation, is it? And if it's not a privacy violation, then what exactly are the 'privacy issues' of which you speak?

--
DNA is a Turing machine. You, however, being dynamic and emergent, are not.
Re:Privacy issues by bla · 2000-04-14 02:21 · Score: 1

i'm guessing because in jenni's case it's voluntary. i happen to not like the idea of people looking into my window, or listening to my phone conversations, or reading my email, or whathaveyou. but if she doesn't mind, then all power to her. it's the matter of personal choice. we don't want people dictating how much privacy we have (or don't have), so why should we dictate it for someone else? and since she's doing it voluntarily, why not support such a blatant choice to dictate one's own personal amount of privacy? granted, it's not as interesting as someone saying "i don't want anyone to see my life" and having a blank webpage 24/7, but the principle behind it is the same. or at least, that's how i see it :)

Re:Can you say LOSER?! by daviddennis · 2000-04-15 00:45 · Score: 2

Well, I fell for her after seeing her web pages and having numerous emails and phone conversations with her, so I think your judgement is a shade harsh.

But read my original message a bit closely, and you'll realize that I echo your thoughts to a large extent - and that's why I quit viewing the JenniCam entirely.

D

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Re:A little self-indulgent nostalgia by daviddennis · 2000-04-15 00:48 · Score: 2

I suppose I really should have mentioned the sequel.

After having run the archive for years (albiet not having updated it in well over a year), I was contacted by someone proporting to be her. The message was chilly-cold corporate: You no longer have permission to use those pictures, take them down or we sue.

I thought it was much unlike the Jen I knew, but this was confirmed by others. As I said on the page I created immediately after I received the request: "I change, Jen changes, we all change. Allow me to shed a tear".

Note that I never made one thin dime from my archive, although at the time I was asked to take it down I was considering using it as a traffic source for some of my other projects.

D

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A little self-indulgent nostalgia by daviddennis · 2000-04-13 21:52 · Score: 5

The moment I saw the old pages she created at Dickinson college, I fell in love with Jenni. When she was knocked off server after server due to the popularity of her content, I gave her a home on amazing.com.

And then she created the JenniCam. I well remember that dramatic moment, her always loveable enthusiasm: "I got a cam for my birthday!* And you do know what I'm going to do with it, don't you?"

I didn't. But I soon found out. At first it was something special for her favourite fans. Then word spread. I didn't like it because I knew my server couldn't handle the hits. So she got another server, had someone design her JENNICAM format, and off she ran. I liked the personal feeling of her old pages more than the almost corporate look she has now, but that's just me.

At first, I loved the cam just as I adored its object. I lovingly collected the best images into an archive that was probably the most popular thing I've ever done on the Internet.

But then she told me she could never, ever love me - and I told myself "You know, watching this thing is just twisting the knife in the wound. It hurts like crazy and doesn't get me anywhere". And so I stopped, cold turkey. From watching the thing in every spare moment I could get, I basically stopped. For a while I maintained the archive because my fellow fans loved it so much, but that fell by the wayside.

The JenniCam was not the first webcam, but it was the first webcam to feature a girl's life. It spawned thousands of imitators, none of which had quite the "real" spirit of the original. Curiously, sometimes the simplest ideas are the hardest to think of - and the most apparently obvious once they're created. I can tell you through numerous email and phone conversations with her that she is a highly creative and intelligent woman.

Incidentally, her BDSM pages, which were erotically charged creations, were taken down by her when she received one too many insulting comments. And she stopped doing her incredibly creative "shows" when she got death threats if she didn't continue. I consider this to be the depressing side of creative expression on the Internet.

Sadly, we've drifted apart over the years, but I still remember her fondly and wish her luck, wherever she is and whatever she does.

D

(*) I don't remember if it was birthday or christmas or whatever -- but it was a gift from her parents.

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Anybody want to see a CmdrTaco cam? by Guppy · 2000-04-13 20:09 · Score: 3

Well?

Seriously, once you take out the fact that Jenni happens to be a pretty young lady (who sometimes gets naked) and replace it with a guy, the concept looses some of it's charm (OK, maybe not for the geek girls out there).

Re:Anybody want to see a CmdrTaco cam? by ssimpson · 2000-04-13 21:46 · Score: 2

Pretty young lady? WTF!
Have you ever seen a picture of her?!!?!

--
"Mary had a crypto key, she kept it in escrow, and everything that Mary said, the Feds were sure to know."

Re:JenniCam - what's in it for me. by jabber · 2000-04-14 00:21 · Score: 1

Feel better now?

--

-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.

JenniCam - what's in it for me. by jabber · 2000-04-13 19:31 · Score: 5

Kudos to Jenni, congratulations for sticking to your guns and putting your life on display.

Kudos to CT for seeing JenniCam as worthy of a Slashdot article.

I've seen posts here, mostly commenting how JenniCam is about Jenni 'doing' her boyfriend. Grow up guys. Read the journals and get a clue.

/Disclaimer: I am NOT a JenniCam subscriber. I just pop in now and again out of curiosity.

Some time ago, Jennifer went through a messy situation with her folks. At that same time, I had a very similar thing happen in my family. I'm a grown adult, but it still shakes you to the core to see your parents at each other's throats. Reading about Jenni's experiences, having a glimpse inside her feelings - which she bravely puts on display - helped me realize, confront and resolve my own issues. Jenni, thanks.

That was a rather singular event, but it made me a fan of Jenni's courage. She's forced me to consider the fact that I'm neither special nor typical - just like her. So she takes her boyfriend to bed on the Internet. So what? She also does yoga, pets her cats, hacks on her PCs, watches South Park...

She's one of us, whatever US means. She just doesn't hide any aspect; doesn't consider things dirty or inappropriate. Such restrictions are ours to place on ourselves.

So, Jen, thanks a bunch for exposing your self (and I do mean SELF, not body). It's nice to know another person. Best of luck in CA.

--

-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.

Re:Earlier webcams by DHartung · 2000-04-14 10:12 · Score: 2

Uh, he said "the web wasn't around then". Not "the Internet". The web wouldn't be invented for two more years.
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--
lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}

Re:Earlier webcams by DHartung · 2000-04-14 10:17 · Score: 2

Surely everyone realises that webcams have been around for a lot longer than this. The Cambridge Coffee pot claims to be the first, dating back to 1991.

And I was strongly affected by the bravery of that little coffee pot in baring its every waking moment to the world.

No duh. Nobody said that Jenni was the first "webcam". There were even peoplecams long before her -- I remember there was some lady programmer who had one at her desk, and people watching THAT one crashed her work server, so she got rid of it. (Men with deskcams didn't seem to have the same problem....) Jenni was the first webcam subject to go online 24/7. There still aren't many ... at least, many who do this for personal reasons and aren't hired by Seth Breidbart.
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--
lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}

Re:Maybe A Little Background Would Help? by DHartung · 2000-04-14 10:20 · Score: 2

Not the first webcam site.

The first lifecam. Don't make this into something it's not, and the people who are flaming back with "fishcam" and "coffeecam" are also missing the unique aspects of Ms. Ringley's innovation.
----

--
lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}

Re:Not geek news, what?? by Julius+X · 2000-04-13 19:11 · Score: 1

If you'd noticed I also stated earlier in my post that if not the first, defnitely one of the post.

But in any case, the coffee pot isn't autoreloading, which is really one of the functions required for a "webcam", and something Jenni has had the entire time. (I rememver even CNET's original studio cam, which came after they ran a story on her, had an autoreloader and ran on NS 2.0)

-Julius X

--

-Julius X
remove "-whatkindofspamdoyoutakemefor-" from email to send

Not geek news, what?? by Julius+X · 2000-04-13 18:56 · Score: 5

I'm kind of surprised, as I haven't really seen any posts backing up CmdrTaco on this one.

Honestly, I agree with him, that Jennicam was the first(if not the first, than one of the first) sites on the internet that showed just to what degree someone could go on a website.

Jennicam is one of those sites that really shows why the internet is such a stronger medium than we've ever had available before, because one can expose themselves to the entire public, but at the same time, be completely hidden as well.

I, for one, admire Jenni, and think that she, if nothing else, deserves a little recognition on /. when such an anniversary comes about. She launched a net trend, the webcam, which should definitely be counted as "news for nerds". But in any case, it's definitely "stuff that matters."
(This isn't just pr0n here guys, take some time to actually read the site)

-Julius X

--

-Julius X
remove "-whatkindofspamdoyoutakemefor-" from email to send

Re:Not geek news, what?? by Stephen · 2000-04-13 19:06 · Score: 2

She launched a net trend, the webcam, which should definitely be counted as "news for nerds".
I agree it's "news for nerds", but I would argue that the Cambridge coffee pot was the first Webcam to become famous, and to launch the trend.

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11.00100100001111110110101010001000100001011010001 1000010001101001100010011
Re:Not geek news, what?? by Ransom342 · 2000-04-14 01:03 · Score: 1

I would have to agree. I have always thought that she should get credit for the mainstream media movies "The Truman Show" and "EdTV".

It may be old fashioned vouyerism, but it it sites like hers that bought it to the pop culture surface again. The fact is a large percentage of the population gets pleasure out of immersing themselves in someone elses lives and forgetting about their own. Its a web-based Melrose place.

Just my opinion ...

Being down: A haiku by Johnboy · 2000-04-13 18:55 · Score: 1

Jennicam is down
Who taught her web-admin stuff,
Cmdr Taco?

--
-- Liquor up front, poker in the rear.

Re:Bit more information by robinjo · 2000-04-13 21:27 · Score: 2

She has also recently sold her bed on Ebay for $2,760!

Big deal. She bought it two years ago for $3100.

Re:How is this news? by Badgerman · 2000-04-13 18:40 · Score: 2

Actually it's news because its netculture. You can think its ridiculous, pathetic, etc., but it is part of what's going on on the net.

Four years of voyeurism. Damn.

--
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu

Re:It is pr0n. by KFury · 2000-04-14 00:03 · Score: 2

People that defend pornography generally view pornography. At least, that's what I've seen.

This is flawed logic, and highly circular. People who defend porn and view porn, don't go around saying that it's not porn. I view JenniCam, and I view porn, but I don't think that JenniCam is porn any more than life in and of itself is pron. The voyeurism slant doesn't work either, because she's openly letting you into her life.

Also, it's not a 'show' because she is, as much as possible, not changing her normal lifestyle to appease an audience.

Obviously Caimlas doesn't watch Jennicam, because he/she doesn't like porn, and has somehow decided that it is porn, but making judgements on it, and the truthfulness of the people who participate in it in that context, is stupid.

Kevin Fox

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Kevin Fox

see for yourself by delmoi · 2000-04-14 23:06 · Score: 1

http://www.jennicam.org/gallery/funk27.jpg

--

ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n

Getting down by delmoi · 2000-04-14 23:09 · Score: 1

Her sever is up, but she is definetly getting down...

--

ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n

Re:It is pr0n. by plunge · 2000-04-14 04:57 · Score: 2

Course, most "naked girl" webcams don't go to the extent that JenniCam did when it had full on sex on camera. THAT's vouyerism, but it's not legally porn unless its shown explicitly sexual purpose- in this case it was just something that happened on camera, along with the rest of jenni's life.

correct URL by pixelbeat · 2000-04-13 18:39 · Score: 1

At least you got the URL right this time :-)
Previously you posted www.jennicam.com !
which is pr0n.

Re:correct URL by BacOs · 2000-04-13 19:09 · Score: 1

Jennicam.com is not pr0n unless you consider the Jennicam pr0n. Jennicam.com points to jennicam.org.

Thanks by Russ+Nelson · 2000-04-13 20:48 · Score: 2

Thanks! I'm glad *you* got the joke. Honest to goodness, some people need a humor IV drip.
-russ

--
Don't piss off The Angry Economist

I only watch it for the stories by Russ+Nelson · 2000-04-13 18:43 · Score: 4

I only watch Jennicam for the stories.
-russ

--
Don't piss off The Angry Economist

Re:Earlier webcams by Zurk · 2000-04-14 08:16 · Score: 1

i was on the internet at that point mainly going thru whois, telnet (yeah..telnet ports were open and allowed you to login to machines...i even logged into some nasa machines), archie (who can forget that?), gopher (text based WWW type protocol -- you could have continous connections thru it - really kewl), fido echoes (still around i see) and uucp for new transfers and stuff...i was on an irix box waay back then on a fairly decent link (around 100K or so) and i remember the coffee thing when it started..i think it used toi be a simple text type sensor and not a camera..it then evolved if i recall correctly.

Re:This IS News by ceeam · 2000-04-13 18:58 · Score: 1

Yippie!! An idea: slashdot should post a news story everytime someone naked appears on j.c.

Re:It is pr0n. by CAIMLAS · 2000-04-13 22:36 · Score: 2

I agree. People might take it as an offense, but the only reason they're saying it's not porn is because they view it, and they don't like the stigmatism of looking at porn. They view porn as a bad thing (and it is).

People that defend pornography generally view pornography. At least, that's what I've seen.

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CAIMLAS

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~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers

she's been slashdotted by drfalken · 2000-04-13 19:28 · Score: 1

looks like she got slashdotted by this article. Growl!

Re:she's been slashdotted by suss · 2000-04-14 05:54 · Score: 1

Oh my god! They've slashdotted Jenni! You bastards!

Huh? by GoofyBoy · 2000-04-13 18:38 · Score: 1

>nuts how Jenni's little cam became such a fixture on The Internet

What? I never even heard of her and her cam until this article.

I think someone has a *crush*.