What the Heck Keeps Tim Urban on American Idol?

There is an obvious answer to this, which is that he is just getting enough votes, but on his best day with the best song he could possibly pick, he does not belong in this contest's finalists, let alone remaining when other, much more talented singers have left.

American Idol is in reality, a singing contest, but it is also a popularity contest. After selecting the top finalists, the judges have no direct relation to who stays each week, other than by influencing voters by their comments. The American public has often seen, in past years, many less talented finalists remain on the show just because they got the votes, for one reason or another. In the past, some performers' personalities just appealed to the public, which inspired votes. Other times, less talented performers life stories inspired the public to keep voting. In the end, a very talented artist has won every year, in spite of these less talented artists who made us all wonder why they remained on the show at all.

There are so many other factors that effect the votes as well, from controversies, to media spin of the day to what else happens to be on opposite TV channels that night. There is always enough media spin near the end of the contest to wake up the public's attention to begin watching, even if they hadn't watched for the whole season. The show's popularity also attracts well-known performers, which increases the ratings as well. When the show nears it's last few shows, many more viewers seem to begin calling for their favorites, spurred on by the show's host reminders that anyone can leave if they do not get the votes.

This article's purpose is not to bash Tim Urban, but merely to point out how American Idol has the ability to give such opportunity to young talent to be discovered, when they may have not ever been known at all, and yet, because of the judging being left strictly up to viewers calling in votes, some very talented artists end up leaving the show before lesser talented ones do. Tim Urban is just one of those finalists, as others in previous years, who just get votes. In Urban's case, most likely due to his appearance and personality being loved by a large amount of young girls who do call in, while an extremely talented artist such as Michael Lynche received the least amount of votes a couple of weeks ago, only to be saved by the one time "keep vote" from the judges.

It's odd, in this writer's opinion, that they don't give half the scoring to the judges each week and half for callers, as they do in Dancing With the Stars. Why even keep the judges on every week, when all they do is give their opinion of each performance but no value in scoring them? I say, change the rules for American Idol to have the judges score each performance each week as half their score or do away with them after they pick the finalists.

Source: http://www.americanidol.com/contestants/season_9/
Source: http://www.examiner.com/x-11363-TV-Examiner~y2010m4d7-American-Idol-Tim-Urban-talks-about-Simon-Cowell--and-the-hair