BREAKING: Most People Are Bad Singers, Refuse To Acknowledge It; Rupert Murdoch Still Smarter Than You

American Idol has returned!!!

AI vets know that this part of the season highlights the worst of the worst. Indeed, it was the train-wreck failed auditions that originally hooked people on AI in the first place [remember back in '02 when AI watchers -- especially those who tuned in after hearing their friends describe Simon's sharp-tounged put-downs of the losers who had no clue they couldn't sing -- were disappointed that the remaining contestants' reasonable vocal skills were not prompting much biting criticism from the judges???].

As AI has evolved over time, and grown into a cultural phenomenon that leaves network execs at networks not named "FOX" shaking in the corners of padded rooms, both the judges and the potential "contestants" have gotten savvier about 1) delivering what the viewers want in the early weeks [audition train-wrecks and put-downs], and 2) how to make the most out of their one chance at 15-minute-fame. Thus, we get auditioners that are either delusional about their lack of talent, or deliberately bombing hoping to be the next William Hung -- or both [Troy Benham, the "Urban Amish" guy who claims never to have seen AI, and to not even have "broadcast television", but who somehow manages to be on MySpace -- I'm calling you out!!!] -- along with judges who are overly critical of marginally-talented performers [seriously, I didn't think Jessica Rhode -- the Jewel fan who kicked off the Minneapolis show by singing "Who Will Save Your Soul" to her idol -- was really that bad, and certainly not "that bad" enough to deserve the evisceration she got from the judges].

If you are even remotely interested in what happens on AI, you don't need me to link to the multitude of reviews of the first two installments of AI6. But I will link to maybe the most interesting resource -- and perhaps the most linked-to out there -- about the first two nights. Eric over at deathbycamera has done some awesome work tracking down the MySpace pages of some of this year's contestants -- winners and losers. Please note -- depending on when you check these out, some of the profiles may be already gone [including, sadly, the profile of the afore-mentioned Jessica Rhode, who listed among her "music interests" some band called "The Google Dolls"]: Minneapolis; Seattle.

deathbycamera's work got me thinking about AI in the MySpace era. Although MySpace has been around for a couple of years now, deathbycamera's work is the first I've seen connecting the contestants to MySpace profiles. Which got me thinking.

I'm sure you all know that AI is the highest-rated show on television. Tuesday's AI6 premiere was the highest-rated show in the key 18-49 demographic -- over 37 million viewers -- since the Friends finale in May 2004. But MySpace's traffic is even gaudier than that. Reliable MySpace data is hard to come by, but it is estimated that there are approximately 150 million MySpace accounts.

MySpace, you may recall, was originally designed as a community site for musicians / bands to connect with their fans unfiltered by big record companies and big radio, etc. It still is a must-have-a-profile site for even the biggest names in the business, due to its large user-base of fans who are already used to accessing music in these "non-traditional" online venues.

This large collection of musicians and music-lovers proved a potential rival to the success and influence of AI. Imagine for a moment, if MySpace had decided to organize its own AI-style "competition", it could have quickly cultivated a contestant-space [remember -- You are the Person Of The Year, for good reason] and created an audience that would have made AI's numbers look like the audience for an overnight infomercial on the H&G channel. Imagine further, if MySpace had partnered up with someone else who knew a thing-or-two about marketing music-and-lifestyle to young people [do I have to spell it out??? it rhymes with emteevee...] -- well, that's formidable competition right there.

Okay, so all of that bloviation gets me to what I've been thinking about today:

1) Did Rupert Murdoch buy MySpace because he saw it as his most immediate potential threat to his American Idol cash cow?
2) Was Rupert Murdoch being penny-wise-and-pound-Australian-dollar-foolish in not picking up YouTube, his longer-term, potentially-tougher threat to his American Idol cash cow?
3) If Viacom/MTVN had picked up either MySpace or YouTube when they had the chance, would Tom Freston still have a job???

Discuss...

Bonus gettin'-all-meta-meta-and-shit link: 'Idol 5' runner-up Katharine McPhee to appear on 'Lonelygirl15'



Katharine McPhee is not Kelly Clarkson.

[still waiting for the CD -- only a week-and-a-half to go...]