Broadband Beer Buddies

Beer.com, an entertainment site for beer lovers, and Stella Artois, a global beer brand, are unveiling StellaCam in 10 cities worldwide, in an attempt to establish a world record for the largest online pub crawl.

StellaCam, which is hosted by www.beer.com, offers live streaming views of bars around the world, as well as the ability to chat with bar patrons and even buy them a beer. StellaCam, which is sponsored by Stella Artois, is intended to create a global community of beer lovers and promote relationships between beer lovers worldwide.

Online Venue (www.onlinevenue.com), which is providing the streaming technology and real-time bar patron interaction at 100Kbps, is also providing the e-commerce tools for remote beer purchases. Online users can buy a beer for patrons at the StellaCam bars for $7.00 U.S., including tax and tip, charged to a credit card.

"StellaCam gives beer lovers and lovers of the beer lifestyle access to a live party every day, all day from anywhere in the world," said Aidan Tracey, general manager for beer.com. "It's a refreshing way for bar patrons and Internet users to interact on a scale and scope never attempted before — just to have fun, meet new and interesting people, and share a cold one."

Users can bar hop through such StellaCam locations in Europe as Brussels, Budapest, Edinburgh, and London, then head over to the U.S. to visit bars in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Chicago and San Francisco. Users can crack open a virtual pint in Canada as well, in locations such as Toronto and Vancouver. Additional destinations will be online by mid-summer as beer.com moves toward its goal of installing a StellaCam in the most popular bars in every major time zone around the world.

Participants can help to establish a world record for the largest online pub crawl by logging on to any of beer.com's StellaCam destinations starting 12:01 a.m. EDT, May 10, 2001, until 12:01 a.m. EDT, May 11, 2001.

To access StellaCam, users will need a minimum of ISDN or cable connectivity and Windows Media Player.