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CHARLESTON, S.C.– In the land of YouTube, Obama Girl is queen.
Or so it seemed on Monday night, as the woman who plays the title role in the viral “Obama Girl” videos made her way through the hall, spin room and after-events of the first-ever YouTube presidential debate.
The invited guest of the folks at YouTube, Amber Lee Ettinger met Democratic presidential candidates (Joe Biden and Dennis Kucinich), posed for pictures with politicos and, yes, gave interviews to journalists.
Carrying her khaki suit jacket as he followed her through the spin room was “Obama Girl” creator Ben Relles, who conceived of the pro-Obama music video now seen by millions of people, thanks to YouTube.
Relles sees as a political breakthrough the YouTube-CNN debate, in which random people posed the questions by videotaping them at home and sending them in via the Internet.
“What’s so exciting is that individuals have a power they didn’t have before,” said Relles, who was on the scene of the debate in Charleston, S.C. collecting video for the commentary he posts at www.barelypolitical.com. “What we did was tip-of-the-iceberg. You’re going to see people making videos that change other people’s point of view.”
A former journalism student at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Relles said he sees a downside to the rising influence of YouTube in the body politic.
“It’s somewhat scary,” he said. “People sometimes take things as fact just because they’re on the Internet.”
Likewise, after granting an interview to one male journalist – who was remarkably energetic for that close to midnight – Ettinger allowed that user-generated political messages aren’t flawless.
“I see where he’s coming from,” she said of Democratic candidate Mike Gravel, who suggested during the debate that the funky new format was too much stagecraft.
“But,” she countered, “it’s getting people involved.”
Roughly 3,000 people sent in video questions for the Democratic candidates. CNN and YouTube will reprise the act in mid-September, when they host the Republicans.
No word yet if “Giuliani Girl” will attend.