Hackers want their own Logitech avatars

Web cameras produced by digital toolmaker Logitech are making more news: some good, some not so good.

First, the good: The mushrooming popularity of video-upload sites such as YouTube, Break.com and AddictingClips.com appears to be spurring sales of Web and digital cameras.

Back in March, a 17-year-old girl altered her appearance with whacky cartoon features in a video clip she posted on YouTube. The video ignited a buying frenzy for Logitech's Quickcam Orbit MP, the camera used to shoot the clip.

With a click of a button, Bowiechick, the filmmaker's YouTube user name, switched from wearing a mustache to donning a gas mask to turning herself into a shark. Her Quickcam is equipped with Logitech's Video Effects software, which generate a host of cartoon images and avatars.

Logitech isn't saying whether Bowiechick helped its Webcam business, but the company acknowledged in an e-mail this week that sales for the quarter ended in March grew 61 percent over the same period last year.

Quickcam Orbit sales for the March quarter more than doubled from the year-ago period.

The bad news is a group of do-it-yourself techies are bent on hacking Logitech's effects to create their own cartoon images and avatars.

Make Magazine, a publication devoted to do-it-yourself technology, is promoting the hacking attempt, says Phillip Torrone, the magazine's senior editor.

"We're going to do it," said Torrone, who demonstrated Logitech's special effects with his own YouTube video last week. "It's just a matter of time."

Torrone said that such a hack would be good for Logitech. Customers would love to create their own cartoon features and avatars.

The company disagrees. "We do have multiple levels of security and we recommend that people download the effects from the Logitech Web site," said Nancy Morrison, Logitech's spokeswoman. "Then they know its trusted content."

What kind of images and features would Torrone and his buddies create if they're successful in hacking the software? You can bet, said Torrone, that some will be "inappropriate."