Britains Got.. ah, who cares...

I’ve seen examples of parallel parking that possessed more skill than some of the chumps on Britain’s Got Talent over the past few weeks.
I’ve a number of issues with the show. Number one, it doesn’t differentiate between a learned talent and a latent one. The assorted magicians, standups, dancers, stunt cyclists, artists and impressionists have spent years (or, more likely, weeks considering the general standard) putting together their act and practising it.
But as if to purposefully insult them, singers and eyeball… er… protrusionists strut on stage to share their natural and relatively unpractised gift, only to sail through to the final. Not that I feel any significant sympathy - that's only a minor issue.
Secondly, Cowell’s protestations that he had not fixed the competition to promote 12-year-old singer Ronan Parke may be true in practice, but it’s not really the full story. With a production team furiously editing together sympathetic or ridiculing montages for each contestant it’s not as if he has no say in the matter. That and considering it was his hand picked jury that put young Ronan through to the finals - whilst whimpering their unbridled passion for his cover versions - there are few charges to face.
That's the problem with Cowell's breed of pay-as-you-vote shows. There's a twisted kind of genius to them. The public pays for the privilege to pick an act to be sold back to them, while Simon reaps it in at every stage of the proceedings.
Lets break it down – He gets a huge commission fee from ITV, especially for the two hour specials; he gets the money from the millions of phone-in votes; he gets the multimillion pound Moneysupermarket.com etc sponsorship; he gets exclusive contractual access to the winners and probably the losers picked by the public; he gets the majority of the record sales, performance fees, tour tickets, merchandise and sync fees from the artists he signs to his contracts; free advertising for acts signed to his label that perform on the show, and payment for the acts not signed to him – and all this while coming across as if he's doing the country a favour by bringing said chumps to their attention.
And so what if underdog ‘crazy-jaw’ Jai did win? He and wee Ronan are still going to get wrung dry.