Gamu

Like it or loathe it, the ‘business end’ of the X Factor begins this Saturday.

And as usual, it wouldn’t be the start of the X Factor live shows without some kind of supplementary controversy to generate ‘interest’ and ‘buzz’ around the start of the show. Last year it was the inclusion of Irish twins John and Edward Grimes (whose names were merged by the media to form the popular meme Jedward) over contestants with arguably more “talent”.

This year, it’s the omission of contestant Gamu Nhengu that’s really riled people up. All sorts of questionable notions have been banded round – including allegations of racist judges, and worries over immigration issues. Although Cheryl Cole does have ‘previous’ for racially aggravated assault, this time it doesn’t really stand up as she put through mixed-race contestant Rebecca Ferguson. ITV have also denied Gamu has kicked off the show because of her lack of Visa.

A (side) issue that I’d like to talk about is the effectiveness of social media protests – this week a gluttony of ‘Bring back Gamu’ type Facebook groups have sprung up, the largest of which boasts membership figures of nearly 250,000 (at the time of writing). But what can these types of groups / fan pages hope to achieve?

The judges have long made up their minds about which act(s) they believe can win the show, and although 250,000 people would potentially be a sizeable percentage of an audience phone vote, there should still be the feeling of ‘the house always wins’. Assuming that every single person votes once at 50p a go - then that’s £125,000. If they all vote twice, it doubles – and so on. But where does the money go – straight into the ITV / Syco Productions coffers.

The problem with these ‘protest groups’ is simple – getting people to act upon them. In shows of this nature (where a telephone vote is required) this is a problem, and the numbers of people actively spending money to vote will be significantly lower than the number of people in a Facebook group.

I’d like to point out that I personally have no problem with people making and joining these groups, but I usually steer clear because it’s always such a futile gesture. Simon Cowell won’t be scouring the web looking for ‘Save Gamu’ groups, and nobody would expect him to be. Sure it’s important to stick up for causes you believe in, but keep some perspective - this is a television show looking for a recording artist, and there’s arguably better ways to make a living in the music industry anyway (but that’s an entirely different subject).

Back to PR stuff now - in terms of managing reputations the producers are playing a very risky game – on one hand they have generated massive ‘buzz’ within the media and the show continues to be in the limelight ahead of the all-important live shows this Saturday. The flip side is that this controversy may be damaging to the X Factor brand, in a similar way to that of the Big Brother scandals of recent years (‘Fight Night’ in 2005, and the Jade Goody race issues in 2007). An additional worry is to what steps and extremes the producers will have to take in the future just to maintain the interest of the public before the live shows next year.

In my opinion the show will continue to remain successful, purely because the show is a monolith in terms of both Saturday night entertainment, as well as a sizable part of the music industry at large. It matters little about who the contestants and judges involved are, because the house always wins.

• Is the reputation of the X Factor so strong that it cant be damaged?
• Does protesting on social media channels make a difference?
• Should there be more scrutiny into contestants’ eligibility in future?
• Would Gamu even progress that far in the X Factor competition?

Let me know what you think.

Paul