BOCA RATON, Fla. — Greg Clayman, a co-founder of VS Media and former president and CEO of Flirt4Free, has died, according to recent industry reports. He was 56. No cause of death was immediately disclosed.
Clayman helped build one of the earliest live cam businesses on the web. VS Media was founded in 1996, and company materials have described Flirt4Free as the first and longest-running provider of online webcam entertainment. In a 2024 domain dispute decision, the World Intellectual Property Organization said the company’s Flirt4Free domain was registered in 1999 and averaged about 52.5 million visits a month in June and July 2024.
He started the company with Chuck Tsiamis, a childhood friend, after the pair left the insurance business during the early commercial internet boom. A 2002 Los Angeles Business Journal profile said the two had known each other since third grade and had already built VS Media into a profitable, debt-free Southern California company by the early 2000s. ABC News, reporting on the online adult business at the time, also described Clayman and Tsiamis as former insurance workers who launched VS Media in 1996.
As the market changed, Clayman stayed closely identified with product development and technical experimentation. In 2015, Flirt4Free announced an exclusive partnership with Kiiroo to add connected haptic technology to its live video platform, saying the move reflected the company’s effort to keep evolving nearly two decades after launch.
His company also stepped outside its core cam business at times. In 2017, VS Media donated the Gay.com domain to the Los Angeles LGBT Center after inviting charities to submit proposals for how the address could be used to serve the LGBTQ community. The Center later highlighted the transfer in its annual report, describing it as the result of the “Gay.com Charity Challenge.”
Flirt4Free remains operated by VS Media, which lists Westlake Village, California, as its U.S. base. On its site, the company says its affiliate program has been running since 1996, underscoring the staying power of a business Clayman helped establish in the internet’s early years.
Connor Young, CEO of YNOT, said Clayman’s influence extended well beyond the company he built. “Greg helped shape an entire era of this industry’s online business with vision, discipline and a real respect for people. He created opportunities for others, and his influence will be felt for years to come.”
For many across the sector, Clayman’s legacy rests not only in having arrived early, but in helping prove that live, one-to-one web video could become a durable global business. Public records and company statements show the platform he helped launch in the 1990s is still reaching a mass audience decades later.
