This Is The Buzzy Democratic Firm That Botched The Iowa Caucuses

[LiberalArkie]

A tech company affiliated with and funded by Acronym, a Democratic digital nonprofit group that has rapidly expanded in recent years, was responsible for building the Iowa caucus app that contributed to delays in reporting Monday night’s results in the first vote in the party’s presidential race. Multiple Democratic sources, including one of the presidential campaigns, confirmed the app’s creator.

State campaign finance records indicate the Iowa Democratic Party paid Shadow, a tech company that joined with Acronym last year, more than $60,000 for “website development” over two installments in November and December of last year. A Democratic source with knowledge of the process said those payments were for the app that caucus site leaders were supposed to use to upload the results at their locales.

Gerard Niemira, a veteran of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, is the head of Shadow. He previously served as chief technology officer and chief operating officer of Acronym, according to his LinkedIn page. In 2019, David Plouffe, one of the chief architects of President Barack Obama’s wins, joined the board of advisers for Acronym.

Acronym spokesman Kyle Tharp put out a statement distancing the group from Shadow, saying that Acronym is merely an investor in the for-profit company.

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https://www.huffpost.com/entry/iowa-caucus-app-shadow_n_5e390191c5b687dacc722824

[honest.abe]

1. $60K is rather cheap for an app like this.

You get what you pay for.

[LiberalArkie]

2. The name of the company says something I do not like.

Shadow

A shadow is a dark (real image) area where light from a light source is blocked by an opaque object. It occupies all of the three-dimensional volume behind an object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two-dimensional silhouette, or a reverse projection of the object blocking the light.

[ismnotwasm]

8. I named my puppy Shadow

She’s a German Shepard

[Recursion]

4. If I were bidding this out I would assume they left out a zero

That's ludicrously low

[honest.abe]

5. Exactly.

I think I could build it for about 200-300K.

[Recursion]

6. Remember it includes hosting the back-end

That's why I was thinking about twice that.

[honest.abe]

7. Yeah, that would add significant cost.

60K is ridiculous.

[Devil Child]

3. Shadow...

Who the hell names this stuff?