Phillip de Vellis, an employee of Blue State Digital, admitted to creating the popular YouTube.com spoof.
Blue State Digital handles the techical side of Obama's website and one of the founders of the company is on leave while managing the new media division of the Obama campaign. However, de Vellis, who resigned from his job, stated that he made the video on his own and that neither his company or the Obama campaign knew anything about it.
An official Obama response also denied any knowledge of the making of the video. And the head of Blue State Digital released the following statement:
Our Statement On The 1984 Video
Statement from Thomas Gensemer, Managing Director, Blue State Digital
This afternoon, an employee at our firm, Phillip de Vellis, received a call from Arianna Huffington of "The Huffington Post" regarding the "1984" video currently circulating online. Initially, de Vellis refused to respond to her requests. He has since acknowledged to Blue State Digital that he was the creator of the video.
Pursuant to company policy regarding outside political work or commentary on behalf of our clients or otherwise, Mr. de Vellis has been terminated from Blue State Digital effective immediately.
Blue State Digital is under contract with the Obama Campaign for technology pursuits including software development and hosting. Additionally, one of our founding partners is on leave from the company to work directly for the campaign at headquarters.
However, Blue State Digital is not currently engaged in any relationship with the Obama Campaign for creative or non-technical services.
Mr. de Vellis created this video on his own time. It was done without the knowledge of management, and was in no way tied to his work at the firm or our formal engagement [on technology pursuits] with the Obama campaign.
I have spoken with David Plouffe, Sen. Obama's campaign manager, to inform him of this action and am appreciative of his understanding and ongoing support of our work.
We wish Mr. de Vellis well in his future endeavors.
http://www.bluestatedigital.com/2007/03/on_the_1984_video.html
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