Social networking unleashed

There's social networking, and then there's retro social networking – the kind without photo-scanning, customer-care staffs, and safety czars. Sites like Stickam.com, the New York Times reports, "which is building a business by going where others fear to tread: into the realm of unfiltered live broadcasts from Web cameras." Stickam hosts live video chat for users, "often from their bedrooms and all without monitoring by any of Stickam’s 35 employees." [Remember Justin Berry, who, within weeks of buying himself a Webcam at age 13, was making money exposing himself for adults online (see the New York Times a year ago).] There are also video-hosting sites without a lot of rules. Besides Paris-based DailyMotion (see "Parenting media-sharers"), the Times mentions London-based LiveLeak, which "has positioned itself as a source for reality-based fare like footage of Iraq battle scenes and grisly accidents." But the article says what worries children's advocates most is sites like Stickam that host "continuous self-produced reality TV show starring [users] themselves."