If painting a message on The Rock for the university population wasn’t public enough, now the rest of the world can see it too.

The Rock became home to the first Northwestern webcam last August when University Relations installed a camera on top of University Hall. The webcam, nicknamed “Wildcam,” can be accessed at http://www.northwestern.edu/wildcam.

The School of Communication installed a second webcam last summer that films Lake Michigan from its perch at the Theatre and Interpretation Center.

The webcams are a surprise to many students, including Education freshman Laura McCann, who guarded The Rock on Tuesday unaware that people could be watching her on the Internet.

“That’s really funny considering I was here at 5:30 this morning singing and dancing to Madonna,” she said. “Now I know.”

The cameras are not meant to play Big Brother to NU students, said Staci Roberts, director of Web communications.

“It was developed specifically for its fun appeal,” Roberts said. “It’s like eye candy for the Web site.”

Officials placed the cameras on top of buildings so they wouldn’t show enough detail to infringe on everyone’s personal space, said Mark Swindle, webmaster for the School of Communication Web site.

“You might see someone walking on the beach, but (the cameras) don’t invade anyone’s privacy,” he said.

The School of Communication plans to install another webcam on the roof of the Frances Searle Building that also will scope out Lake Michigan.

“A lot of our Web site exists for prospective students to understand what it’s like here,” Swindle said. “We want them to see the lake and how close the school is to Chicago.”

Weinberg freshman Emma Hanke said she had no problem with the cameras keeping an eye on NU.

“They can put them wherever they want,” she said. “As long as they’re not in my room.”

Traffic on the Wildcam site is low since many students don’t know about it, Roberts said.

Weinberg freshman Lauren Skalina discovered the webcam when she saw her friend watching it.

“It’s fun to watch people when they don’t know you’re watching them,” she said.