They can be anywhere in the world and while you're happily surfing away at ten in the morning it can be the wee small hours in some parts of the states. Web cams are used for a range of purposes from the practical to the absurd or downright silly. IBM Almaden Research Center's CattleCam being a case in point. Until you realise that all a Black bear does in hibernation in the backwoods of Minnesota is sleep and all you see is a vaguely furry black object curled up on the floor. If you're lucky it might yawn.
Web cams are ideal for a bit of vicarious travel and there are some genuinely good sites around.
I mean cams that don't just transmit the same dismal image 24-hours a day. Cabbie Clever da Silva introduced the world to New York City via the first ever internet cab in March 1999. As he drove his fares around the Big Apple in his big yellow taxi his dashboard camera broadcast the impromptu city tours to millions of netheads worldwide. Just three months later the cult site was bought up by the Realtime Web Network Corporation and nowadays da Silva no longer picks up actual fares but concentrates on taking his virtual passengers on sightseeing trips. You can read da Silva's accounts of being a New York cabbie online in English , Spanish or Portuguese .