[2][3] Previously, live webcams transmitted static shots from cameras aimed through windows or at coffee pots.
[9] "It was basically a programming challenge to myself to see if I could set up the script that would take the pictures, upload them to this site,...just to get that happening automatically, and I shared it with a couple of friends, kinda 'look, I got this working.
[16] Nate Lanxon of CNET said "remember this is 1996 and the Web as we know it now had barely lost its virginity, let alone given birth to the God-child we know as the modern Internet.
[21] The hackers turned out to be approximately 100 people including a handful of teen pranksters,[22] Ringley stopped doing stripteases after that.
Initially, the camera tended to be turned off during especially private moments, but eventually this custom was abandoned, and images were captured of Ringley engaging in sex.
One camera – a Mac WebCam – captured the rooms at the clip of one photo per minute, even when vacant, and posted them to her web page.
[22] As Ringley attracted a following both on and off the Internet, more than 100 media outlets from The Wall Street Journal to Modern Ferret ran features.
[25] As an actress, she was cast in "Rear Windows '98," a 1998 episode of the TV series Diagnosis: Murder, portraying Joannecam, a fictionalized version of herself.
She also hosted her own Internet talk show titled The Jennishow[26] on The Sync, an early webcasting network based in Laurel, Maryland.
Ringley's standard of living improved with a larger apartment, expensive furniture, and several business trips to Amsterdam with her accountant.
"[29] When Ringley moved to Sacramento, California, she documented the boxing of her possessions with free live streaming and full audio.
Ringley received some criticism from fans when she became involved with Dex, a man who was the fiancé of a fellow webcammer and friend who helped her move to California.
[37] By 2007, Ringley had worked for a web developer after a brief stint as a case worker for a social services agency in Sacramento.