They may not be able to sing, but you can bet they’ll write about it …
LAST week I touched on how I thought bloggers and podcasters would participate in the General Elections (GE) by talking about the rallies and speeches.
This week, as if to give even more of an indication of things to come, there was an event which was covered in some detail by several bloggers. I’m talking about this year’s Singapore Idol auditions.
Read more at TODAYonline: [pdf][text]
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Yuhui (yuhuibc.blogspot.com) attended and documented the scene outside Orchard Cineleisure last week where a long line of audition hopefuls had formed, and where local celebrity Gurmit Singh and radio personality Daniel Ong were on hand to shoot footage of the event.
Yuhui then described how the crowd started getting impatient due to the long periods of inactivity.
“For long stretches of time, nothing much happened. Daniel kept saying drivel like ‘We’ll begin in just a short moment’ and ‘We’re just minutes away’,” he wrote.
“The crowd basically booed him whenever he said that.”
There were even a handful who blogged ‘live’ from location, such as chicory v (chicory-v.livejournal.com), although all she said was: “I’m here! Come see me and Juliet and Jas and Stef and Thiru …”The audition is delayed, as usual.”
Esotism (esotism.livejournal. com) passed the first round of auditions, and unfortunately was too busy to document it much, but promised to do so when there was “more time on my hands”.
Another hopeful, swirl2me (swirl2me.livejournal.com) was just as successful — except he mistakenly thought that he’d been eliminated at the first hurdle. So nervous was he that he misheard the numbers called out when they were announcing those who didn’t make it past the first round.
He recounted how he was recalled by the auditioners:
Idol staff: “Mr Awasthi, how come you left so fast?”
swirl2me: “Erm, my number was called out so I left.”
“No. I called out 3049.”
“Oh! I’m 3409 … you mean I’m in?”
“Yes, can you come back up to the ninth floor please?”
As with any good contest, you’d have detractors claiming the whole thing to be a sham, or close to one.
Although it’s not a new argument, fizusthemissus (fizusthemissus.livejournal.com) declared the outcome of the contest to be incongruent with the notion of talent.
“So what if you’re the next Singapore Idol? Some real, good talent was sacrificed along the way because they didn’t look good enough for TV,” she wailed.
Not content with merely questioning the object of the contest, she has also criticised issues such as the lack of space at the venue: “Suntec has many many exhibition halls. Lots and lots of space. Cineleisure does not have space.”
The long queues and safety concerns were also an issue.
“There was absolutely no shade to be found where the participants were queueing; neither did I spot any paramedics. A participant who faints from the heat and fatigue (not unlikely), could receive no professional medical attention,” she concluded.
Mr Miyagi aka Benjamin Lee has been entertaining readers at https://www.miyagi.sg for over a year, and will exercise his vote at this year’s Idol contest.
Some Idol Hopefuls’ Blogs:
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