Trojan room coffee pot
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The Trojan room coffee pot was the inspiration for the world's first webcam. The coffee pot was located in the Trojan Room, within the old Computer Laboratory of the University of Cambridge. The webcam was created to help people working in other parts of the building avoid pointless trips to the coffee room by providing a live picture of the state of the coffee pot. The camera was installed on a local network in 1991 using a video capture card on an Acorn Archimedes. Employing the X Window System protocol, Quentin Stafford-Fraser wrote the client software and Paul Jardetzky wrote the server.
When web-browsers gained the ability to display images in March 1993, it was clear this would be an easier way to make the picture available. The camera was connected to the Internet in November 1993 by Daniel Gordon and Martyn Johnson. It therefore became visible to all Internet users and grew into a popular landmark of the early web.
At 0954 UTC on 22 August 2001 the camera was finally switched off and the pot (actually the fourth or fifth seen on-line) was auctioned on eBay for £3350 to Spiegel Online.
External links
- The Trojan Room Coffee Machine (http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/coffee/coffee.html)
- Trojan Room Coffee Pot resources (http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/coffee/qsf/)