People have no idea how hard webcam sites are to run until they actually run one... it is infinitely more harder than running a standard paysite where you just update content. Here are some basics:
1) $4500 -- Macromedia Flash Server 100 connection license
2) $5000 - $10000 -- Programming the flash software
3) $5000 - $10000 -- Programming the MySQL/PHP backend
4) At least three boxes at first -- one for MySQL, one for web server,and one for FlashComm server
Ok, that's just the initial coding... and the coding will HAVE to have all the bells and whistled for fraud protection, model/studio management, content management, customer service
Fraud prevention is VERY important.. you will have to be able to pay 24/7 fraud staff to monitor every transaction...
we have three people per shift, 24/7 who look at EVERY SINGLE CHAT and every single video to make sure there is no fraud because fraud is a SERIOUS issue with webcam sites. You have to have good programming to auto-detect most fraud with geo-ip targeting and other important factors, but in addition to this, you must have staff looking at chat logs, because despite the best programming, a lot of fraud is subjective
Then, you have to be able to get traffic.. it's sort of the chicken and the egg with webcam site traffic because no studios are going to work on your site if you don't have traffic.. you will have to give them a guarantee to do so until you get built up enough
I think the initial outlay is at least $50k and you better hope you don't get hit by fraud w/o good staff because you will lose your merchant account before you even get started
