BLOOMINGTON - They survive on mac and cheese between business trips to five-star hotels in Beverly Hills and top-floor offices in Chicago skyscrapers. See the video.

They developed perhaps the latest in Web site technology from a four-car garage in Bloomington, rivaling Internet darlings like YouTube and MySpace.

All but one dropped out of college, following the lead of tech pioneers like Bill Gates.

The lone student, meanwhile, receives credit from Illinois Wesleyan University for the work he's putting into his upstart Internet business.

"The institution recognizes that the business he is developing is an exciting opportunity," said Darcy Greder, associate dean of student affairs at Illinois Wesleyan.

"This isn't just an Internet startup company. These are programs that didn't exist before they created it. The intellectual property they've created is incredible."

The business

Wesleyan senior Adam Fichman launched www.1Dawg.com Dec. 1 with friends Austin Hurst, Zach Hurst and John Jawed. The site is more than a year in the making and drew significant interest after its launch - about 30,000 unique hits in the first two weeks.

A celebrity-owned real estate firm flew the four founders to Beverly Hills this summer, put them up in a five-star hotel and made an offer to buy the site, said Fichman, a business major.

No sale.

As the 1Dawg team sees it, Google bought YouTube for $1.6 billion in October, and their technology is more advanced.

The site is a compilation of user-submitted videos, a collection of off-beat, witty, sad, hilarious, bizarre, sometimes even stupid moments. On one video, an IWU student covers his body in peanut butter and parades around campus. In another, a man is dumped after proposing to his girlfriend in front of a packed audience at a basketball game.

Video sites like this have been a buzz in the Internet world.

Unlike competitors, however, 1Dawg allows users to download videos in multiple formats or send videos to friends' cell phones with one click. The site automatically converts files for compatibility with iPod, Zune, Archos, PSP and other brands. No other site boasts such technology.

"If we get 1 percent of the video market share, we'd be living well," Zach Hurst said modestly.

Hard road

At this point, though, they have a good concept but no market share, and they're relieved to get this far. It wasn't easy.

The Hurst twins dropped out of college and moved to Bloomington after much persuasion from Fichman. The three met at a religious youth group in their hometown of Kansas City, Kan., and developed the 1Dawg concept years ago.

Jawed quit a full-time programming job in California to move here with little more than Hawaiian t-shirts and a couple light jackets.

"I'd never seen snow before," he said.

Now, they have one of many, many startup businesses competing for users on the World Wide Web.

They don't have money, however.

"You go to bed at night not knowing where your next meal's coming from because you put all your money into servers because of this dream you have," Zach Hurst said. "We're almost broke, but we're at the point where the Web site is up and ready to start making some money."

That's Fichman's charge. The Hurst twins and Jawed handle the technology, while Fichman fishes for money.

He targets revenue in four areas:

Advertising: Selling ad space to companies.

Fees: Users pay to have their videos displayed prominently.

Sales: Independent or label producers sell full-length movies or other large files for 99 cents a pop.

Licensing: Companies, schools and other organizations could use 1Dawg software for podcasting and other video functions.

Fichman travels weekly to Chicago, St. Louis and other cities trying to shore up investors, persistently calling banks until they let him in the door.

Educational endeavor

It's a learning experience for Fichman, and IWU gives him credit.

"There are many brilliant people in technology who never get degrees," Greder said, adding that Fichman won't be one of them.

His education isn't a free ride, however. The majority of his credits were completed in a traditional fashion, she said.

Only in his senior year did he approach Illinois Wesleyan with the concept of using 1Dawg as an independent study.

"Experience in the field was more applicable than sitting in a classroom," Fichman said.

Sammie Robinson, an assistant professor of business administration and Fichman's academic advisor, structured his coursework around the 1Dawg business.

She watched him complete class after class for several years and even met his parents. Then the 1Dawg venture grew legs, and Fichman contemplated dropping out. Robinson wouldn't have it, so she worked with him on a schedule.

"I'm feeling about Adam the way I feel about these basketball players that leave in their senior year to go to the NBA. I just feel so strongly about the power of education," Robinson said. "They think they're going to be rich and famous and perhaps they will, but we are such a credential society and I wanted him to get that.

"If the university is willing to do this, he has a responsibility to his alma mater. If and when he does do well financially, he ought to think how he should share that with his alma mater."

Four guys, 1Dawg

Here are the minds behind 1Dawg.com, a Web site allowing users to download videos in multiple formats and send them to friends' cell phones with one click:

Adam Fichman, 21, "The Face."

Fichman calls himself the "cool" in a room full of computer geeks. As the least tech savvy person in the group, he concentrates on investor relations and financials, often acting as the face of the business. He spends many sleepless nights reading business journals.

Zach Hurst, 20, "The Glue."

Hurst does a little of everything, piecing together the technology side with the business side while serving as the idea man to give the site added quirks. He basically locked himself inside a garage for nearly three months to write the business plan for 1Dawg.

John Jawed, 22, "The Brain."

Jawed is responsible for the guts of the Web site: the software, the programming and the research. He developed his first computer program in the eighth grade for a graphic calculator and has bounced around several well-known companies, including Google and Time Warner Cable.

Austin Hurst, 20, "The Style."

He is not just Zach's twin brother along for the ride. Austin Hurst created his own Web site development-and-design company, Dominant Design Group, at the age of 15. He's responsible for the style and design of 1Dawg.com.

1Dawg, one dream

The Web site is the culmination of the four young men's ideas. Fichman and the Hurst twins grew up together in Kansas City, Kansas, and met Jawed, who moved to Bloomington from California, through online gaming. Fichman, an Illinois Wesleyan University senior, invited the three friends to move to Bloomington to help develop their dream. They launched the Web site Dec. 1.