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Chatting with Jenni
Doing the research for this column can be a tough job, but I never complain
By David "Spam Me and Die" Fiedler
I couldn't take my eyes off her...
Well. Here she was, in the flesh, a living, breathing woman whom I had seen naked any number of times (on her Web site, at least). So perhaps, as a healthy male, I could be excused if I kept looking right at her...
OK, you dirty-minded scoundrels out there. It was her smile I was looking at.
And it wasn't that the rest of her was offensive to the eye, or that I was trying desperately to lock my eyes onto some part of her body that wouldn't offend her while we were talking.
After all, Jennifer Ringley is used to being looked at. Her apartment in Washington, D.C. is wired with dozens of cameras connected to a Web server so that her thousands of monthly subscribers (and anyone else who cares to view, although not as frequently updated) can watch her simply go through life. She spends a great deal of time indoors; 14 hours a day just on the computer. Her cameras cover her bedroom, living room, kitchen, and bathroom. In essence, she lives in full view of the entire world.
She gets 5 million hits a day.
Predictably, some people have sniffed that she couldn't have much of a real life (although that accusation might be more properly directed at anyone who sits at her Web site constantly to watch what she's doing), and that she's some kind of exhibitionist slut. Like a current controversy in New York City (where Mayor Rudolph Giuliani has been frothing at the mouth over a piece of artwork that he hasn't taken the elementary step of actually seeing himself), Jenni's detractors don't have a clue because they're working from a near-total lack of information. They couldn't have spent much time actually looking at her site, and they certainly don't know Jenni herself.
Jennicam.org is not about titillation, though I'm sure there are many people that frequent the site just to catch a glimpse of their favorite body part. She doesn't act out people's fantasies; she is just there being herself. The most offensive thing about her Web site is the obscene bandwidth charges she undoubtedly pays every month, and I say that as the father of two boys in elementary school.
Jenni is taller, thinner, and prettier than you might guess from those little Webcam photos. That's partially a result of the relatively wide-angle lenses necessary to cover a reasonable area indoors, but it's also because the lady just doesn't translate well to still photos. She has a very expressive face (and then there's that devastating smile...), and with all her on-camera poise, would be a natural for movies or TV, if she were interested in appearing on such.
While I'm not going to pretend a deep personal relationship with her on the basis of our meeting at the Fall Internet World show yesterday*, I do have a great deal of experience talking to PR people, marketing reps, and BS artists of all kinds, and I can say that Jenni is a Real Person with no artifice about her. She is very secure, very open, and very honest. Money is not her goal (she turned down a very lucrative offer from a Well-Known Soft Drink Company to simply be seen drinking their product on her site). I believe, in the words of another woman who also has no apologies for her talent, that the Girl Just Wants To Have Fun.
-- D. Fiedler
P.S. In the interest of Full Disclosure, I did get a personally dedicated and autographed picture from Jenni. Don't expect to see it on eBay.
P.P.S. Oh, by the way...in her day job, she's a Web Developer.
* Besides, I seem to get in enough relationship trouble even without this complicating factor. In fact, this particular column will probably not help improve things in any way.
David Fiedler is Editor-in-Chief of WebDeveloper.com, and his opinions are definitely his own.
Last modified: Tue Jan 4 04:35:03 EST 2000
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