Jules, please do! At length! We'd all love to hear it. Please, share your knowledge, and post any links too, that support it. Thanks!

Thanks, rdw187! It's going in the article now

We know the show isn't about undiscovered talent. That's why I wrote the article Now everyone in America can find out.

Honestly, if this came to a shock to anyone on this site, you haven't been reading it that long.

American Idol has never been about finding the best undiscovered talent. Anyone who knows the truth about the auditions knows this. People with the best voices are turned away. People with the most horrible voices are put through to sing for the judges. Why? One word, ladies and gentlemen, RATINGS. They put people through that have commercial appeal. If you can sell, you can get through. Even if you're the best singer, if you don't have a "story" or a quirk that makes you memorable, you don't have a chance. Even if you do manage to get through, you won't survive to the top five. I'm convinced that this is the point where the voting just doesn't matter, it just matters that the pimped ones make it through. And anyone who disbelieves me need only look at Sanjaya. He went from not just being safe, but being in the top 3 to completely eliminated in one episode? You believe that I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn.

AI is like any reality show. They need to keep making it bigger and more spectacular to keep it running. And nothing gets people watching like a good controversy. Example: Survivor- China. Excuse me, but what kind of arrogant American jerks are we that we go to a country that has over 1.1 BILLION people and host a show that involves Americans "surviving" in the harsh terrain. Like thousands, if not millions, of Chinese haven't done it before. So if AI gets a nice big controversy brewing, it gets talk about the show going. And, as they say, no publicity is bad publicity.

AI just can't admit they have made some big mistakes in the most recent seasons. They wound up with Taylor Hicks and Katherine McPhee, both of whom have been giant commercial flops. Who sells from Season 5? Chris Daughtry, the rocker they clensed their hands of. Ooops. So what do they need to do now? Take people who already have a foot in the door and throw as many of them as they possibly can to the AI voters. Why? It's much easier to clean up a previously released record and pimp it as a new one then it is to write and record a whole new album. Why is this important? Because by the time Jordin Sparks or Taylor Hicks manage to crank out an album the public has moved on and forgotten them. "Oh, they won American Idol, didn't they? Let's go look at the new Britney album." Someone with a previous album could feasibly have that album out on shelves within weeks of winning the competition, not months, and they might be able to sell a few at the live concerts.

So let AI try to throw in a bunch of "ringers". People will eventually find out the truth, and they'll probably become disillusioned with the whole AI scheme after that. They'll move on to the next show that promises to promote the "next big undiscovered talent." I believe that if the story gets widespread (and believed) this could very well be the end of AI. And it'll be funny because they did it to themselves.

AI is proof that no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.

You also forgot about Kimberly Caldwell, season 2 finalist. Here is an excerpt from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kimberly_Caldwell:

"Kim Caldwell first sang publicly at the age of five at beauty pageants. She was a five time junior vocalist winner on Star Search, and also performed at the Grand Ole Opry. In 1995, she sang at the 50th wedding anniversary of former President George H. W. Bush and Barbara Bush. She also appeared on the second and final season of Popstars: USA, where she was rejected from the group and told she would do better as a solo vocalist."

They can try to rig the show like they did last year, they can even hand pick the winner. It's not going to matter because in the end people don't care about who wins this contest when it's over. The one thing Nigel can't do is make the public actually BUY this swill.

If Nigel were a genius, he'd be looking for the next Sanjaya. Since Nigel is a lying manipulative passive aggressive douchebag, he can't see the inerent value in allowing America to both enjoy the competition and have some suspense built into the results.

And so he leaves it to Dave to be the genius.

Go Funnystone! Can't wait to find out who we will be supporting this year! America should thank us for making this shit on a stick show interesting again!

Magooish

Jules,

Nikki was on the show "Popstars" prior to auditioning for American Idol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikki_McKibbin).

To add to your list of contestants who were discovered before, I have also added Kimberly Caldwell from season two. Just scroll down the page to see what type of connections she had before she auditioned for American Idol.

Great job Dave, but this is too many plants for me to keep track of. When we hit top 24, perhaps you could just write an article about the ones that are not plants? It should be quite short.

Dave and Worster Detectives: BRILLIANT, OUTSTANDING AND MAGNIFICENT job WELL DONE!!!

STP - This was one of THE BEST and most moving posts I've ever read here...thank you.

M-Dawg