If you watched the season finale of “American Idol,” you may have been shocked that low keyed, humble Kris Allen beat Adam Lambert, the obvious forerunner since – well, about the first day on the big stage. Oddly enough, Kris Allen was surprised when Kris Allen was named the newest American Idol.
Now, the New York Times thinks Allen had a little extra help from AT&T in winning the title. Some fans in Arkansas could use their mobile phones to cast blocks of votes for Allen. However, AT&T didn’t provide the same option for Lambert’s fans. Maybe AT&T thought he didn’t need it.
In case you don’t watch Idol and have no idea what I am talking about, each week, fans vote for their favorite contestant. Fans can call a toll free number or text their votes from a cell phone, if they are AT&T customers. It seems that AT&T reps gave the people attending two parties in Arkansas (Allen is from Conway, AR) demo phones and instructions on how they could power text. That means they could send 10 or more text messages all at once. Some believe this is effects voting as it is easier to send more votes this way rather than just by sending a single text message or placing a phone call on a land line.
Fox officials along with FreemantleMedia North American and 19 Entertainment (which produces Idol) issued a statement which read, “FOX and the producers of AMERICAN IDOL are absolutely certain that the results of this competition are fair, accurate and verified. Kris Allen is, without a doubt, the American Idol. We have an independent third-party monitoring procedure in place to ensure the integrity of the voting process. In no way did any individuals unfairly influence the outcome of the competition.”
AT&T said, “In Arkansas, we were invited to attend the local watch parties organized by the community. A few local employees brought a small number of demo phones with them and provided texting tutorials to those who were interested.” It also seems as if AT&T did encouraged Lambert fans in San Diego via a flyer to purchase an AT&T phone so they could send out “between 3K-5K votes in 2 hours” by power texting.
The Times did point out that Idol warns fans that votes that are placed using technical enhancements may not be counted, so no one really knows if the power texts were counted or not. And Idol is notorious for being closed lipped about their voting.
Regardless, we will probably never know the truth of what happened and this may tarnish Allen’s win with some.