A story on Engadget (via RCR News) caught my eye this morning, simply because of what to me is the absurdity of the background.

According to the stories, the SMS voting record for American Idol has been skewed in favour of contestants from southern American states because only Cingular customers are able to vote. And the majority of Cingular's customers are from the South. As a result, the winners of American Idol are all from the southern half of the country.

Cingular Wireless L.L.C., which sponsors Fox TV's hit reality show, is based in Atlanta and claims 20 million subscribers in the South, the market research firm said. And half of the reported 18 million Cingular subscribers who actively use text messaging are from the carrier's home region, more than doubling the number of Cingular text message users from any other region.

The 5-year-old show has crowned winners from Texas, North Carolina, Oklahoma and two from Alabama.

What strikes me as absurd is that only customers of one particular carrier are allowed to vote. While I understand the idea behind the exclusive sponsorship deal, by deliberately excluding a portion of your viewing population (an estimated 35,000,000 viewers tuned in for the show's fifth season) you are likely to skew any voting that may occur, with preference shown for the region where your largest subscriber base is.

In the UK, similar programs are all quite deliberately cross-carrier, even if sponsored by one particular operator. With operator subscriptions at roughly equal levels across the majors, Locking premium SMS-based voting to only one carrier automatically drops your potential revenue.