There was some discussion of the rules changing this year that would allow people to come back who hadn’t made it out of the semifinals. It may only be rumors but that is why I listed them.

Just a thought…if WGWG are what the majority of the AI community wants, why would TPTB choose to ignore them?

if WGWG are what the majority of the AI community wants, why would TPTB choose to ignore them?

Good question, whoisthatwoman. Why would they? Five winners from the same genre would only concern TPTB if it affected their income. They don’t make their Bank from the winners after the show – they sell ad space based on people tuning in during  the show. The drop in viewership across all Network TV shows and how it affects ad rates is more likely to be the issue that needs addressing.

But they also set up this voting system..and everyone who watches doesn’t necessarily vote.  IF the majority of the voting is for a particular genre – that doesn’t mean the majority of the viewers want them – but the majority of the voters. And it doesn’t even mean that – some people vote a few times, some people vote more, some people vote for two hours. Can they really know what the majority for the viewers is, based on the voting? Do they even care? I don’t think they do, or not all that much.

 Outside of bragging rights when selling ad space, how else does the voting affect the advertising revenue? Of course they wouldn’t like to see the voting totals drop – bad PR for the show – but would the viewing numbers drop in the same percentile? We see the viewer totals drop, but the voting totals aren’t as closely reported, til the Finale.

Which opens up a lot more questions. If there are no contestants from the genre that has been getting the most votes – do TPTB have data that leads them to believe the people who like that genre will still even watch the show? Maybe vote for their second favorite genre? Or not watch at all? They have other choices now. How much would that mess with the Ad rates?

If they are hoping to refresh the viewing pool, and keep them – it will take more than different judges, it will also need different contestants, themes, and song catalog – and a willingness to possibly lose the viewers who may no longer have anyone in their preferred genre to watch OR vote for…so, no reason to stay. What’s the tipping point on that demographic – and will the theorized new demographic have different watching/voting patterns?

I have my own theories about why the Five in a Row – more like a WAG than a theory, really…but from the edits and judging we have seen in the past three seasons, TPTB were doing nothing to discourage the viewers from attaching to those eventual winners – and they could have. Actually, they did quite the opposite. 

Their actions haven’t convinced me that they care who wins, just who watches, and how many. That’s their Bottom Line. The new panel is a gamble, IMO. A form of secondary insurance for viewer interest. It’s gonna come down to whether the viewers like the cast and the music enough to stick around, as it always has. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.

JMO. Of Course.

if they only had not cast Phillip in the first place and cast Jermaine instead as the 12th guy I think they would have had a non white guy winner.

Then Colton Dixon would have probably won.  Or Reed Grimm, Chase Likens would have been voted into the the Top 12 by the public.  And there would not have been a Home.

But it’s also very unlikely will they be able to repeat the monster success of Home, so I can see Interscope/Jimmy Iovine trying to move in a different direction and fill a niche that he doesn’t have – possibly the big voice, pop/r&B girl singer – like Candice Glover.

But whoever wins, has to be able to sell.

If they are hoping to refresh the viewing pool, and keep them – it will take more than different judges, it will also need different contestants, themes, and song catalog – and a willingness to possibly lose the viewers who may no longer have anyone in their preferred genre to watch OR vote for…so, no reason to stay. What’s the tipping point on that demographic – and will the theorized new demographic have different watching/voting patterns?

I think what it’s going to take is to have a contestant of a different genre that really emerges as a star, a risk taker, and that really gets through to the media, which will draw in new fans. I don’t believe this has really occured in the past few years.  And I agree that the actions of the producers haven’t shown they want something different anyway. 

And yes, it would be difficult to gain enough new viewers and especially effect the voting.  Just changing the judges isn’t going to affect the outcome of the show even if it gains new viewers unless they like and vote for the contestants.  Though if it does result in a different type of winner, that’s ok too, because it doesn’t help the previous winners to be lumped together the way they are, even though they are different and have had varying levels of success, which is different for different artists.

I don’t think that they would seriously consider letting former semifinalsts audition again. They had their chance, and if TPTB and producers didn’t like them enough to promote them the first time, why would they now?  I agree a lot of women have been out and out robbed throughout the years, like Mishavonna and Lauren Turner, but I doubt they would want to come back given the chance. They might be a little bitter about Idol not giving them a fair chance. I would be. I mean, they got hardly any screen time, did well enough to get a call back to the wildcard, but didn’t get asked back. 

Out of the top 24 boys, Deandre, Jeremy, Chase, Colton, and Eben weren’t big voice “screamers.”

I don’t remember Colton hitting or trying to hit any glory high note. Just some bad notes.

I doubt that. The X Factor this year had a similar ratings decline to Season 11, and a girl won the first season of X Factor. So I think that the theory that the ratings are down due to WGWG is dead.

Idk. I think there are casual fans of Idol that now get the WGWG thing. I mean didn’t the Associated Press and other media outlets mention  WGWG in their articles about Idol? Even late night tv caught on to it. I remember Jimmy Kimmel saying something similar to it on his show about Idol.

I agree that song arrangement seems to be a key aspect of the past winners (Scotty might be the exception and be genre related as you say), but after 2 years of contestants known for their arrangements seems enough (S9 is kind of own arrangement filled so it seems ordinary) for me, and even contestants that do try changing arrangements (Haley, Casey, Naima, Skylar, etc.) still fail to have a stable run in the show. Many thought that Colton’s arrangement of “Bad Romance” & “September” may have contributed to his ouster and before that he had many different song arrangements already (successfully not landing B3 before) so song arrangement might not be the key to winning.

I don’t think it’s just song arrangement either, it’s if the arrangement really shows both who they are as artists, and is something the majority of viewers like. Really, I think of when a song is well liked on the show it becomes a hit in a way, gets higher sales,  and more buzz than the others, and that leads to the contestants getting more votes.

Which I think Skylar IMO shown during “Born This Way” (who knew country would be mixed in the song) or Haley with “You & I”? Admittedly those two songs made the singers safe when they sang them, but what about “RITD” of Haley, I meant it sound like a song she would sing and is a different arrangement than the usual, but they still have difficulty breaking to win. 
Skylar is one example of a contestant who knows who she is as an artist, shows originality by changing non-country songs to countrify it (I think she did more noticeable song changes than Phillip IMO) and also singing country songs, but is still falls to the B3, until she was eliminated 5th. The closest to Philip is Elise, though I admit that some of her arrangements do not come out successfully, is as original as Phillip (and is quite more vocally proficient than him). 

One example though of a bad live song performance IMO that still managed to sell is “Time of the Season” that after Phillip won still has more iTunes sales than some of Jessica & Joshua’s shining moments. I just think that Phillip just had the fanbase that would vote/support him (which is good) no matter what he does. 

The thing that I noticed during the last 4 seasons, except Kris’ (Adam is almost a polar opposite to Kris so Kris is a “musical alternative”, while the others have similarities to each other: Lee/Crystal, Scotty/Lauren), is that they have the early support of the production (I mean Heejun is probably most remembered for his comedy style during Hollywood week than performances later on and is more popular than say Erika who has excellent performances but was not featured much and always lands in the B3 (for girls in Top 13 week) every week in the Finals and was undeservedly eliminated during Top 10) and is more praised relatively to the praises given to other contestants. If Jessica was not bussed during Top 3, I just have the slightest feeling that it would be a Josh/Phillip finale instead, with Phillip still winning so Jessica barely survived that. If the judges put more effort in supporting the contestants (backstory, constructive comments) I think this kind of annoyance from the non-instrumentalist type contestants would not be as much but there is just a certain “shield of invulnerability” when contestants like Phillip shows up and is being focused by the production. JMO of course.