The tech behind the WEBCAM is about 35 years old as of this writing.
Who would have thought that the origins of the WEBCAM would be traced back to the UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE?
It's true.
But unlike most UNIVERSITY TECH STORIES where a product was the result of a student making something that would earn the highest praise on their thesis,
The WEBCAM was actually created to help facilitate the Coffee Rush for Faculty.
Yes. I really do mean it. A FREAKING COFFEE MACHINE facilitated the creation of the Modern Day Webcam.
The story goes that the Faculty at Cambridge were getting mighty pissed about the way things were at the Campus when it came to Coffee.
Ever hate it when you don't have your coffee before you leave your home and you have to fight your grogginess when driving or taking transit when going to school or work?
That's how the Cambridge Faculty felt.
The problem was that for many faculty members, there was a dedicated Coffee Room which meant that for certain staff members located in floors that were a few walking distances away from the room, this would be aggravating for those who make the long trip through the hallways and stairs only to find the Pot empty and devoid of any coffee.
Rather than complain to the upper brass which wouldn't do anything about it, the Faculty decide to take it on to themselves to fix this issue.
Grabbing a CCD Security Camera
and an ACORN ARCHIMEDES Computer,
and an ACORN ARCHIMEDES Computer,
a connection with it was made.
The idea being that if a Security Camera was pointed to a Coffee Pot, then the Faculty can know if there's coffee in the TROJAN ROOM.
And I heard that leftovers of the Coffee often tasted pretty bad according to the faculty so the Camera proved to help people know when there's fresh tasting coffee available.
Sometime later in 1993, the first instances of the WORLD WIDE WEB started to emerge and the existence of the TROJAN COFFEE POT began to circulate and become a fixture in internet popularity.
And thus, the very first WEBCAM was born......
One of the first WEBCAMS to be made available to Consumers would be the SGI INDYCAM released in 1993.
But I can barely classify this Webcam as being made for Consumers due to a multitude of factors.
Because take a look at what Computer this was often paired with:
Ahh yes. The good old SGI INDY Workstation from 1993.
So why am I questioning the INDY Webcam?
Because the host computer, the INDY, had a starting price of $5000 which made it more affordable compared to SGI's other computers which often were over $10,000 more than even the highest end 486 or Macintosh Quadra of the time period.
But even the INDY was often financially out of reach for many users in the 90s.
And like I said in many past posts,
The mentality of many people who had computers was:
VIDEO GAMES.
Yes, many people only bought computers for the sole purpose of playing Video Games, much to the chagrin of parents and Computer Manufacturers.
So to facilitate the needs for the average schmuck who would want a camera for their computer, but don't want to spend thousands on an SGI or Sun Microsystems SunSparc Workstation,
a company decided to release this:
This is the CONNECTIX QUICKCAM
A Webcam that connected to the serial port of your Computer back in the 90s.
In 1998, Logitech would eventually buy CONNECTIX and rebrand the QUICKCAMS under the Logitech Branding and it would stick for many years and counting.
And there were cameras that weren't just for Webcam use but also for DIGITAL CAMERA use just by themselves.... sort of like a hybrid of the tech being used
Like this INTEL POCKET PC CAMERA from the year 2000.
Laptops originally had no webcams installed into them 
until later in the 2000s and by the late 2000s such as 2009, they became more common to be installed on laptops.
until later in the 2000s and by the late 2000s such as 2009, they became more common to be installed on laptops.
Throughout the beginnings of 2020 and beyond, the Webcam would become a highly essential piece of Computers due to the heightened use of Remote Work from Home initiatives as well as the then mandatary SOCIAL DISTANCING so as a result, WEBCAMS became quite scarce during the beginning of the COVID-19 Lockdowns.
But why buy Webcams when practically almost anybody could just use the one built in their laptop?
Well the issue was that LAPTOPS, even high-end ones, often are stuck with CRAPPY 720p Webcams due to the need to cram the components on the thin display panels so that leaves little to no room to cram the more essential 1080p HD or 2160p 4K resolution sensors on the panels without further compromises or further jacking up the price.
I'm no stranger to webcams as I've had some that I used in the past, all of them USB.
My current Webcam that's connect to my MAVERICK FALCON 7900RT build is a
CREATIVE LABS LIVE! CAM SYNC 4K USB Webcam with Backlight Compensation.
Here is the Webcam shown below in this photo of my build.....
This photo is dated October 7 2024 so this preceded the
AMD RYZEN 9 9950X3D upgrade and I still had my Acer Monitor during that time.
I originally wanted one of the Logitech Webcams but I wanted one of the 4K models but they weren't available at the less than $200 price I was asking for so I instead went with this creative one since It was at a nice $70 I was asking for.
That and some of the Logitech ones had no lens cover which in my mind is highly preferred for privacy reasons.
There are Logitech 4K Webcams with lens covers but again, asking price was a bit much for my wallet.
Glad I touched on the subject of the origin of Webcams before DAVID FARQUHAR of THE SILICON UNDERGROUND could beat me to it.
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