Drew Cam

"Drew Cam" is the ninth episode of the fifth season of the American sitcom The Drew Carey Show, and the 110th overall. The episode sees Drew (Drew Carey) becoming a 24-hour salesman for the Winfred-Louder department store. Webcams are installed in his house and he has to promote the store's range of appliances. While Drew is out, the webcams continue to stream events that occur in his house. When the viewers become bored of Drew's life, Kate O'Brien (Christa Miller) is hired to play his girlfriend for the show. She is soon replaced by Isabel (Rosa Blasi), who Kate becomes jealous of. She eventually tells Drew that she loves him during the webcast.

The episode was written by Holly Hester, based on an idea by Michael Becker, and directed by Sam Simon. It first aired on November 17, 1999 on ABC in the United States. Parts of the episode were broadcast simultaneously on television and the Internet, a first for a primetime show. As ABC did not own the online rights to The Drew Carey Show, the company had to work with Warner Bros. Television to produce the webcast. Negotiations between the two companies began in June 1999. ABC and Warner Bros. Television hoped to target around 500,000 viewers of the estimated 4 million US households with Internet access that regularly watched the show.

"Drew Cam" was seen by an estimated 11.2 million viewers, finishing inside the top 20 in the ratings the week it aired. It was the second highest-rated episode of the fifth season. The webcast attracted one of the largest online audiences watching a streaming media event, with the website receiving almost two million visits and 650,000 streams. "Drew Cam" received mixed reviews from critics, with some calling it ambitious, while others thought it was nothing more than a marketing gimmick.