Webcam models

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Webcam models

A couple days ago I came across the term “webcam model” in a financial newsletter I receive. Curious about what a webcam model was I did a google search on the term. I learned:

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A webcam model (colloquially, camgirl, camboy, or cammodel) is a video performer who streams on the Internet with a live webcam broadcast.[1] A webcam model often performs erotic acts online, such as stripping, masturbation, or sex acts in exchange for money, goods, or attention.[2][3] They may also sell videos of their performances. Once viewed as a small niche in the world of adult entertainment, camming became "the engine of the porn industry," according to Alec Helmy, the publisher of XBIZ, a sex-trade industry journal.[4]

As many webcam models operate in the comfort of their own homes, they are free to choose the amount of sexual content for their broadcasts.[5] While most display nudity and sexually provocative behavior, some choose to remain mostly clothed and merely talk about various topics, while still soliciting payment as tips from their fans.[6] Webcam models are predominantly women, and also include noted performers of all genders and sexualities.[7]

Background

The conceptual artist Jenny Ringley is considered the first camgirl. In 1996, as a student at Dickinson College, Ringley created a website called "JenniCam". Her webcam was located in her dorm room and automatically photographed her every few minutes. Ringley viewed her site as a straightforward document of her life. She did not wish to filter the events that were shown on her camera, so sometimes she was shown nude or engaging in sexual behavior, including sexual intercourse and masturbation. These images were then broadcast live over the Internet.[8] Two years later, in 1998, she divided her website's access between free and paying.[9]

Also in 1998, a commercial site called AmandaCam was launched. Amanda's site, like Ringley's, had multiple cameras around her house, which allowed people to look in on her.[6][10] However, Amanda made an important early discovery that would influence the camming industry for decades to come – that a website's popularity could be greatly increased by enabling viewers to chat with a performer while online.[6][11] Within her members section, Amanda made it a point to chat with her viewers for over three hours a day.[6] Since the early days of live webcasts by Ringley and Amanda, the phenomenon of camming has grown to become a multibillion-dollar industry, which has an average of at least 12,500 cam models online at any given time, and more than 240,000 viewers at any given time.[12]

Source: Wikipedia

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Reading this was a bit of a shock to me. I wasn’t familiar with this kind of thing. Not that it really surprises me. It is about what one could expect with the internet, knowing human nature.

I was just reflecting: If you had told me about a thing like this when I was a young boy growing up on our farm I would have never believed it. It would have been too surreal, too far out. It would have just been inconceivable to me that something like this could happen in my country. I would not have been able to believe that any person would do this sort of thing. I would not have believed that any person could have so little self-respect as to do such a thing. I had read the Bible. I knew about ancient depravity from the scripture on Sodom and Gomorrah in the Bible; I knew about the moral depths to which human beings were capable of falling, and I knew there had been moral depravity in ancient Greece and Rome. But that was all kind of in the abstract. It was another place and time. I would not have been able to conceive of that kind of depravity in my own country.

I guess the age I grew up in was a very different age. My wife has told me about relatives of hers who objected to taking off their clothes in a doctor’s office.

16 May 2025