Seems America just can’t get a vote right.
A few days after Fox declared Ruben Studdard winner of “American Idol” after 24 million viewers phoned in votes, a Midwest phone company says it received more than 240,000 misdialed calls–the majority of them votes for runner-up Clay Aiken.
Cinergy Communications, based in Evansville, Ind., said it took 241,496 calls during Fox’s three-hour voting period: 169,382 votes for Aiken and 72,114 votes for Studdard.
The problem, a Cinergy spokesman said, was that callers dialed “Q” instead of “O” (the number was 866-IDOLS01 or IDOLS02), and ended up phoning a church in Franklin, Tenn.
The best part: When voters reached the voice mail system–which clearly states that the caller has reached a church–they still cast their vote.
Ruben’s final winning margin was 130,000 votes, so the extra votes presumably wouldn’t have changed the outcome. Right? Maybe the U.S. Supreme Court should decide.
