Who is Jennifer Kaye Ringley?
Jennifer Kaye Ringley was born in Harrisburg Pennsylvania on August 10th 1976. She is best known as an Internet celebrity for creating “JenniCam.” She is often times regarded as a conceptual artist.
In 1996, during her junior year at Dickinson College,19 year old Jennifer Ringley decided to install a webcam at her dorm, with the intention of allowing others to view her daily activities. Although Jennifer had no intention of sharing intimate moments with the public, she eventually stopped making her life private and decided not to edit or cut any recordings. Ringley’s overall intention was to allow the viewers to see everything, including nudity or any type of sexual behavior, not something many would do voluntarily.
"I keep JenniCam live not because I want or need to be watched, but because I simply don’t mind being watched.”- J.R.
Flashback: Back in 1996, webcams were new use of internet technology. Jenni’s website automatically refreshed every couple minutes and got updated with newest black and white images of her. Ringley caught viewer’s attention for two reasons: sociological status and sexual excitement.
Goodbye Pennsylvania, Hello Washington
After finishing her education at Dickinson College, Jenny moved to Washington D.C. This time, Ringley added more webcams to her new, much more luxurious, apartment. Along with these changes, she also began charging those who went on her site in order for them to have access to the newest images. Life at home was good for Jenni and she called herself a “web designer.”
Stardom
Jennifer Ringley’s website gained instant popularity, with an estimated 3-4 million viewers daily. Surveillance and reality tv shows were becoming an important part of pop culture (Big Brother, The Real World), something which helped Jenni’s “documentary” catch viewers’ interest. At the peak of her stardom, Jenni had attracted hundreds of media outlets, landed a role in “Rear Windows 98, Diagnosis Murder,” her own talk show, and appeared as a special guest on The Late Show with David Letterman.
Sacramento and a bit of Privacy
A few years after moving to Washinton D.C., Jennifer Ringley decided to move to Sacramento, California. Again, she documented her life, including packing her possessions. JenniCam was shut down shortly after her move, with PayPal’s anti nudity policy cited as the main reason. Jenny went on with her life, working for a web developer in Sacramento. Today, Jennifer Wringley no longer has her own website, choosing to live out of the public eye and enjoy her privacy.In 2008, CNET called JenniCam one of the greates websites in history.
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