TVSquad

Rather than have all these various posts about this American Idol poll and that American Idol poll, we decided to pool them all up into one delicious post each week. We will look at a few online polls that were conducted from the end of last week's results up to the performance show Tuesday. And then a few that were conducted after this week's performance show, but before the results were revealed Wednesday.

That way we can see how the week's performances affected a contestant's overall popularity, and how well the internet can predict eliminations. We'll also see how each contestant fared week to week in each poll, moving up or down. If you don't like waving at boring numbers, you might just want to move onto that nice article below this one. It looks friendly enough. But if you like getting mired in stats and rankings and seeing more than any sane human should ever need to about eleven singers, follow me across this jump...


WEEK-TO-WEEK POLLS (PRE-PERFORMANCE)
Well, there was a pretty strong consensus going into this week's performances from all three of our source polls, firmly placing the Davids atop the charts. But, for the first time, David Cook came in just barely ahead of David Archuleta on TV Guide and AOL's polls. In fact, the difference was Clay/Ruben close for AOL.

What's interesting is that these numbers are after Archuleta's performance last week when he forgot the lyrics and flubbed up his performance pretty majorly for the first time. Apparently, it's going to take more than one bad performance to knock this bird off of its perch. That said, it seems like it's going to take a monumental act of god to raise the standings of the likes of Chikezie and Ramiele.

Guide to the polls:
Position - [change from last week] Contestant (Percentage of votes)

TV Guide
1 - [+2] David Cook (28.0%)
2 - [-1] David Archuleta (24.6%)
3 - [+2] Brooke White (14.9%)
4 - [+2] Carly Smithson (11.9%)
5 - [-3] Jason Castro (8.9%)
6 - [-2] Michael Johns (5.6%)
7 - [+3] Amanda Overmyer (1.6%)
8 - [+4] Chikezie (1.4%)
9 - [=] Ramiele Malubay (1.4%)
10 - [-2] Kristy Lee Cook (1.0%)
11 - [=] Syesha Mercado (0.6%)
Poor Syesha. She's so much better than this poll indicates. Hopefully, after her performance Tuesday night, we can see her rise up this chart. Did you notice how the Davids combined hold more than 50% of all the votes?

Votefair.org
1 - [=] David Archuleta (36.4%)
2 - [+4] David Cook (15.4%)
3 - [-1] Brooke White (10.3%)
4 - [+3] Jason Castro (9.8%)
5 - [+1] Michael Johns (7.8%)
6 - [-2] Ramiele Malubay (7.6%)
7 - [-4] Carly Smithson (7.4%)
8 - [+4] Kristy Lee Cook (2.1%)
9 - [=] Chikezie (1.3%)
10 - [=] Syesha Mercado (1.1%)
11 - [-3] Amanda Overmyer (0.8%)
This chart shows the greatest disparity between David A. and the rest of the pack, though I think other polls have made it clear that's not necessarily accurate. Nevertheless, they again hold more than 50% of the total together.

AOL
1 - [+3] David C. (19.6%)
2 - [-1] David A. (19.6%)
3 - [-2] Jason (10.8%)
4 -[+3] Michael (8.5%)
5 - [=] Brooke (8.4%)
6 - [=] Ramiele (6.8%)
7 - [+1] Carly (5.8%)
8 - [+3] Syesha (5.7%)
9 - [=] Amanda (5.7%)
10 - [+2] Chikezie (4.9%)
11 - [-1] Kristy (4.1%)
AOL shows a more balanced poll, though a ridiculously low placement for Chikezie. He actually dropped in the rankings after last week's performances? Ludicrous!

AFTER-PERFORMANCE POLLS
These are the results of polls that didn't start until after Tuesday's performance shows. Archuleta redeemed himself with this week's performance and went straight to the top of all three of our source charts. In fact, factoring in DialIdol's margin of error, they could only predict that David A. was safe. All of the other contestants were still within the margin of error and could have been eliminated. So now we're at the Top 10 and we've still got an apparently lop-sided competition.

But don't be in such a hurry to crown David A. just yet, because David C. remains a strong competitor and a legitimate fighter for that title. And let's give a strong shout out to Syesha Mercado for wowing us all this week and raising her standings considerably. Syesha was an early contender who just never connected with the right song or presentation. At this point, she's really the only female "belter" left. Usually we have several each season, but we've really mixed it up this time around.

Ramiele and Chikizie continue to languish at the bottom of the polls despite obvious singing talent (Ramiele) and hugely improved performances (Chikezie). Is it too late for either of them no matter what they do? Kristy seems a sure thing to go within the next few weeks, and I think she knows it.

As for the Bottom Three last night. Based on all these polls and the judges comments, the only true "shocker" was Carly. Her star hasn't been shining as brightly as it had in the past, but I don't think anyone thought she would come in that low in the voting. Could it be a matter of people assuming she's safe? After all, we've had past contestants like Ruben and Fantasia spend time in the Bottom Three early on and then go on and win the whole thing.

AOL
1 - [=] David A. (20.3%)
2 - [=] David C. (15.0%)
3 - [+2] Jason ( 9.5%)
4 - [-1] Brooke (8.7%)
5 - [+1] Michael (9.2%)
6 - [-3] Carly (8.0%)
7 - [+5] Syesha (7.7%)
8 - [-1] Amanda (5.9%)
9 - [=] Chikezie (5.6%)
10 - [+1] Kristy (5.5%)
11 - [-1] Ramiele (5.5%)
AOL had Amanda toward the bottom, but had a surprisingly close toss-up between Kristy and Ramiele as their pick to go. And here again, Chikezie put on a great show and got no love for it. Syesha, however, gained well based on her excellent performance. Carly finished a very high sixth place considering her ninth place finish in the votings.

Dial Idol
1 - [=] David Archuleta (13.2%)
2 - [+10] Syesha Mercado (6.8%)
3 - [+3] David Cook (5.8%)
4 - [-2] Brooke White (5.3%)
5 - [+3] Jason Castro (5.2%)
6 - [-2] Carly Smithson (5.2%)
7 - [+2] Michael Johns (5.1%)
8 - [+2] Ramiele Malubay (4.8%)
9 - [-6] Chikezie (4.7%)
10 - [-5] Amanda Overmyer (3.7%)
11 - [-4] Kristy Lee Cook (3.4%)
This is the place where Syesha's love came through the most. And as DialIdol bases their figures on tracking the actual phone calls the contestants receive (see their site for details on how that works), you can see that Syesha's fans were furiously dialing for her. Not only because she had a great week, but because of her Bottom Three showing last week. And it worked, though these numbers again have Carly much higher than things turned out for her.

TV Squad
1 - [+5] David Archuleta (29.2%)
2 - [=] David Cook (27.9%)
3 - [+9] Syesha Mercado (11.2%)
4 - [-1] Carly Smithson (6.5%)
5 - [+2] Ramiele Malubay (5.8%)
6 - [-2] Jason Castro (5.7%)
7 - [-4] Chikezie (3.5%)
8 - [=] Michael Johns (2.9%)
9 - [-8] Brooke White (2.9%)
10 - [=] Kristy Lee Cook (2.4%)
11 - [-3] Amanda Overmyer (2.0%)
TV Squad readers, that's you guys, were the only ones to accurately predict Amanda's ouster, and in fact you pretty much nailed the Bottom Two. That said, you guys blew it even more than everyone else with Carly, ranking her fourth. Brooke took a tremendous tumble after her awkward number while Syesha again represented herself well and shot into the Top Three for TVS readers.

What did you guys think? Are these numbers fun to look at? Annoying? Do you have a headache now? Maybe you need a little homework assignment to help it all sink in. Pop quiz, next week? Anyone? Hello?