Even when it’s all finished, the X-Factor can’t help but stay at the forefront of public consciousness. Simon Cowell is riled. Dave Gorman is fed-up. And 798,446 others are excited. But why?
That’s right, it’s the race for the Christmas number one which (shock, horror) for the firt time in years may not be as cut and dried as you would think.
For those of you who are not aware, some bright spark came up with an idea to stop the X-Factor winner’s single getting to it’s inevitable place at the top of the UK charts this Christmas. The idea is simple….. try to outsell the X-factor single. So a suitable track was chosen, namely Killing in the Name by Rage Against the Machine, and a Facebook group was set up encouraging people to buy it in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Pretty much like Cliff Richard did in order to get Millennium Prayer to the top of charts several years ago. The aim is, obviously, to sell more copies of RATM than the X-Factor, thus publicly voicing our disapproval at Simon Cowell and his monoly of the charts, particularly around Christmas. A fine sentiment, I’m sure you agree. But will it make any difference?
Even if (and it is a big if) the X-Factor song is not number one at Christmas it is unlikely to make Simon Cowell sit up and say “hey, do you know what. Public opinion is obviously strong so I’ll stop churning out these pop songs each year”. No. He’s more likely to punish us inventing a mind control device and beaming the X-Factor directly into our brains for 52 weeks every year. Via needles through our eyeballs. While killing a puppy. The evil bastard.
So what is the point you might say? Especially when you consider that Killing in the Name is released on Sony Records, so any money made goes directly to Sony and Simon Cowell anyway. This means we are venting our frustration at Simon Cowell by giving him loads more money. Huh? There’s a fail waiting to happen. It’s a good thing that Simon Cowell is more interested in nurturing talent than making a quick profit. Oh, wait, hang on, I’ve just found that fail.
Anyway, back to the point. The arguments against this campaign are mounting up. But we already know that it won’t change things, so why do it? Because, unlike in X-Factor land, it’s not about the money. It’s about people coming together for a common goal, and uniting, and being heard. 10 years ago something like this would have seemed impossible. But thanks to the power of the internet it is now possible to gather vast numbers of people together in a short space of time. Social networking? I bloody love it. But it’s up to us how we choose to use it.
We can use the internet to whine about things, or we can join together and take action, no matter how small, and make that point. Yes it’s insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but so was “that” Daily Mail article by Jan Moir and look what we achieved there. What is significant is the ability of people to come together and unite for a cause they believe in and each contribute, no matter how small the effort, towards the outcome.
Whether the campaign works or not remains to be seen, but whatever the outcome I’ll be proud to say I tried to buck the system. Long live people power.
