Nick,

As you say, I'm sure that Cowell wouldn't want Wagner to win.  A higher quality winner would be better for the credibility of the X Factor brand in the US.  However, it wouldn't make much difference.  X Factor has only ever produced one credible winner - Leona.  As a result, Leona is trotted out every year to remind us of that credibility.  Meanwhile, most of the other winners from Brookstein to Leon are simply written out of history.  In the same way, Cowell could simply use Leona again in the US for credibility purposes and ignore Wagner, if he were to win.

Also, the Americans didn't take to Will Young when he was used to help establish the American Idol brand and there is no-one in this year's X Factor who is better than Will IMHO.  I suspect that Cowell will use crossovers from his years in American Idol to help establish X Factor eg Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood.  They will have more clout with US viewers that any UK winner, and Cowell can justifiably argue that he was a major part in launching their careers.

Screw Loose: They tried their best with jedward(the sun leak about them topping the vote must have been planned) but ultimately it wouldn't take off. Slightly better chance this year.

There was no 'leak'. Jedward were B4 that week. The Sun were just guessing. Hope that helps.

JR - I do wonder why you are so keen to kill the golden goose? Not only could it be a death knell to publicly voted entertainment shows. It would in all probability mean most high street bookies not bothering to price any of it up and would also lower betting volume on betfair as most of the punters on here would lose confidence in the public vote.
Personally I love Wagner being in there on the back of an anti establishment vote but would not like him to win on the back of an organised campaign.

Johnny,

I'm happy to concede that Leona is not credible (based on both your taste and mine).  However, Cowell uses her for credibility purposes (otherwise why doesn't he invite back someone like Leon).  If we agree that Leona is not credible then there is IMHO no-one from X Factor history who is credible, so I don't understand why another incredible winner would make much difference to anyone.

You mentioned the RATM campaign.  If there had been no RATM campaign then Joe would have sold 500,000 copies of his single, Cowell would have got his 20% cut, and Joe would have got the Christmas No 1.  With the RATM campaign, Joe still sold 500,000 copies, Cowell still got his cut, Sony got their cut of the RATM sales, and Joe's No 1 was delayed for a week.  Some would describe this as a triumph for the RATM campaign.  However, this one week delay in Joe's No 1 was achieved by the RATMers spending around £500,000 of their own money for just over 500,000 copies of a track which either they already owned or which they didn't want at any point prior to the campaign.  Irrespective of this campaign, Cowell has just signed a new 3 year contract with ITV for millions.  It seems to me that the only people who lost out in all of this were the RATMers.

FWIW I agree that it would be funny if Wagner won but, as CJ says, not if that involved ruining a show which provides a good deal of harmless fun for millions including most people on this forum.

The people behind RATM now seem to be doing it full time, ie their business is now getting internet advertising revenue. They need Cowell, Cowell benefits from them, they all benefit except the idiot public who give them their money.

Peter

The RATM campaign was a good old fahioned xmas no.1 battle and we won.

It was a bit of xmas fun.We didn't spend £500k.We spent 29pence here and there to get involved and stick two fingers up at the world.

oh and Cheryl wasn't happy either

yes, the public vote for the winner but Cowell tells them who to vote for

AA

I hope you are well. 

Ok.  At 29p a copy the costs involved in RATM are lower than I had thought (still almost £150,000 for 500,000 though), and you're probably correct that RATM was just a bit of fun for most.  Nobody really got hurt by it.  However, the main point here is that it made absolutely no difference to the Cowell money making juggernaught which just keeps rolling along.  I didn't know that Cowell had offered jobs to the RATM organisers but that just strengthens this main point further. 

Viral marketing is not a threat to Cowell.  It's another tool for him to add to his already considerable marketing clout.  It's another way of generating publicity for the shows - at no cost to Cowell.  Others are arguing that a viral pro-Wagner campaign can be used to bring down the Cowell empire, or, at least to disrupt the launch of X Factor USA.  I don't think it would have that effect at all.

I won't make the same mistake again and try to calculate the costs of a two month Wagner campaign in terms of the costs of the phone votes needed to make it work - most of which money would go to Cowell.  You or someone else would no doubt point out that my sums were wrong.  However, the cost would be considerable.  If people are happy to spend that money, for a laugh, in the off chance that the campaign would work then that's up to them.  If they think that a successful campaign would hurt Cowell, though, then I think they are very wrong.  As someone else said earlier in the thread, if you want to hurt Cowell then the best way to do it is to stop watching the show.

i like that, mix high culture with low culture aa

[:D][:D]

And this is the rule they would quote:


8. RIGGING

Where there is evidence of price, race, match or event rigging we reserve the right to make the bet void or withhold payment of returns pending the outcome of any subsequent investigation.

a wagner win would be a resounding win for the high st bookie, of course they would pay out