LJ Idol Presents:

i'm sorry where is the one they did pick.

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It's in the poll marked "entry".*g*

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duh thanks its only been 20 weeks for me.

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Even though none of you may not know me, the deadline is on my birthday.

But don't try to bribe me with any gifts; I already voted. :D

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tulip-in-yellow.livejournal.com

Pre Happy Birthday, old man!

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Thanks, hun!

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happy almost birthday!

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Thank you! :)

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9am or 9pm Sunday?

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imafarmgirl.livejournal.com

It was hard to decide which entry. I feel as though I am being tortured. Anyone else feel the same?

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rock-princess98.livejournal.com

yeah. i feel. like that.

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155 to 5.

I don't think I can't repeat that enough times, and every single time it just doesn't seem real you know?

Edited Date: 2008-05-24 04:03 am (UTC)

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it is rather bizarre to think about.

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Interesting which entry each contestant wanted to have voted on. Was it their favorite? The one that best represents them as a writer? The one they received the most comments on?

A little from column A and a little from column B?

Regardless... thank you for writing all of them. I did certainly enjoy reading, even if one made my head hurt a little.

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I chose for two reasons. It was imo my best of the three, plus it has been something I have wanted to write about for a long time. When I started lj idol I knew in my head there were two things I wanted to write about. One I knocked out back for the "terror" topic. This one I could have written for several different topics, but I just kept not writing it. I think I was worried I wouldn't be able to do a good job with it, and it was important to me that it be right, because I really want to show it to my mom.

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That makes a lot of sense to me.

Last season and this, I had a lot of entries that I wrote 'to show to my mom.'

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chite.livejournal.com

For my own, I picked the one that I thought was best, but if I had gotten a better immediate response on either of the other two, I might have gone with them. So I guess a little from A and a little from B.

The one I chose was, like kittenboo's, a topic that I had thought I would tackle sometime this season, but I wasn't sure where it would fit in.

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tulip-in-yellow.livejournal.com

I chose my "not waving but drowning" entry because I got lost in it while writing it. It was all so vivid, the adventure and my thoughts during that adventure. It also holds an underlying theme quite precisely about the topic, especially when one takes into account what they've read of my childhood from some of my earlier entries. For me, it tied a good deal of my writing for this entire contest together.

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Hmm...such close voting...should we expect another Saturday night conspiracy this week...or will it happen in the afternoon this time?

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I don't know, when do you have it planned?*G*

Edited Date: 2008-05-24 05:41 pm (UTC)

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Oh, it's coming, brother....

Honestly, I'm impressed how this has taken on a complete Lex in All-Stars Survivor tone.

I mean, it is one thing to play dirty...

It's another thing to play squeaky clean and condemn those who play dirty....

But you have absolutely no qualms (or perhaps be delusional) if you can accept constant outside support from others and shameless promotion, and STILL find a way to complain about other people doing the exact same thing and play the "I'm a victim who's been back stabbed" card.

"Sorry, Ethan...I know we're good pals, but I have to think about myself.........BOSTON ROB, I hate you for betraying me and our friendship is ruined forever!!"

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It's funny you should mention that, since I've been reading over various things over the past couple of days (including being called a douche, that was nice!) and I actually was using the same example in my head.

Which to me highlighted the differences between the Ethan and Boston Rob situations. Not quite sure how I'd put them into Idol - so I'm totally talking out loud here...

With Ethan the two of them had worked together before in a Survivor setting. They attended some functions together, but they weren't BFF. (Tom and Ethan had a much tighter bond, then and now). Lex screwed over Ethan (and man that pissed me off - I expected it, because that's how Lex was in Africa as well with his "gut". Remember him screwing over Kelly?)

So for Lex the situation with Ethan was very much the game.

With Boston Rob, there was pretty tight friendship and he simply didn't expect that line to be crossed. Sort of like with Ozzy this season. He thought that his out of game friendships (*cough* sleeping with Parvarti a couple times post-Cook Islands*cough* were going to translate into someone sitting back and handing him a million dollars.

It didn't work like that, and he mistook a "in the game" favor for an "out of the game" favor.

How I bring that into my Idol mindset, and as I said, it's still developing in my head, is seeing the difference between "organic alliances" and "game alliances". "Orangic" meaning friendships that are already in place from the get-go, and we had several coming in. The most notable being Team Badgerpants, but there were quite a few others. They like each other, and so they support each other.
"Game" meaning people who started talking during the course of the game, liked each other, and wanted to support each other.

It's interesting to me to watch how these both are seen by various people and how they grow and change through the course of a season. Is one better than another? Is one stronger when push comes to shove?

I still get a chuckle thinking about a MUCH earlier discussion on the subject where "someone" made a comment that was *very* anti-game alliance, and then bragged about how he had people who would vote for whoever he told them to without even reading the entries!

That said, I have Survivor Africa loading in another window!*g*

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people seem to confuse the friendship alliances that form during the game, with a strategy alliance. The people I have become friends with in this game are the same people whose writing I enjoy, are the same people that I have tried to help. So to me it's about helping a friend or helping a good writer go farther. It's not about doing something for them so that they will help me or anything like that. But because they formed during the gameplay itself people assume things about it.

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Which is a case I've been making for a long time, that people tend make friends while they are playing and friends do tend to support each other.

I think in the case of sheep stations (because let's face it, we're talking about it.*g*) is that things got off to a bad start when the idea of "blind voting" (and not the BAX kind.*g*) came up from the get-go. That exploded a bit, was discussed within the ranks and resolved that it wasn't going to happen in what? Less than a week?

But I think it stuck in some heads and left a sour taste with some.

The same way that other things that have been said by other people throughout the course of this season have stuck and left the same taste or created an impression.

Let's face it, there are some people who just don't like each other. The same way there are people in other communities who just don't like each other - the difference being that in here you can vote each other out!*G*

The shame of it is, *from my perspective*, that was "power players" trying to throw each other under the bus that caused the problems (because there *was* that going on in a MAJOR way during several points throughout the months), and other people either got hit with the same brush because of their associations and/or their frustrations with the situation led them to make assumptions and "sides" were formed as a result.

(the fascinating thing, *for me*, is that there *is* one contestant who everyone despite everything over the past 7 months still genuinely *likes*. I don't think I've ever heard a single person say a negative word about her. Will that help, or hurt? *shrug* I don't know. We will see how it plays out.)

Edited Date: 2008-05-24 11:54 pm (UTC)

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kathrynrose.livejournal.com

I haven't watched the last several sesaons of Survivor, so I'm missing a lot of the reference, but in my mind there's a difference between supporting a friend whose writing you enjoy and strategically uniting to support one person or group over another, rgardless of the writing. And another level of that, uniting to vote out another person.

I think Sheepstations met with such resistance because it began as an invitation only group, with a promise to vote for everyone in the group regardless of the writing, and then they friends-locked their posts. So it was "exclusive" and "secret" but it existed in the open. I think it took too many people back to the cliques at recess, and songs of "Tick tock the game is locked an nobody else can play."

I don't even know whether people knew each other well enough to not like each other before that period of the game, but whether it was a cause, or a coincidence in timing, it seems to me that's where the hard feelings began, even for people who were not involved directly on either side.

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I only watched the last show of the first season of Survivor so I never have any idea what most people talk about when it comes to reality TV. But I couldn't agree with you more that, "in my mind there's a difference between supporting a friend whose writing you enjoy and strategically uniting to support one person or group over another, rgardless of the writing. And another level of that, uniting to vote out another person."

It was encouraging that the vote was so close this week, even though I didn't like the final tally. At this level of competion its a hard choice and the vote reflected tha.

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I'm still waiting for my team badgerpants T- shirt.

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mme-furiosa.livejournal.com

yeah, um, you weren't a part of the team, buddy.

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I can try. I was head cheerleader.

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It seems to me that everyone has game alliances...I would guess that 3 out of the remaining 4 do...they might not call it that...they might call it "friendship," but c'mon...when someone you didn't know 10 months ago goes out of their way to solicit votes for you, that's an alliance...and even if you choose to call it "just being friends," there is no real difference between that and people actually aren't afraid to use the dirty A word and call it what it is....

As for that someone, I always got a kick out of his hypocrisy, too...

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So resisting the urge to take my own (real) name in vain.

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Well, see... I am having a really, really lousy day. So I am naturally upset with myself.

when you wrote, "people actually aren't afraid to use the dirty A word," I started giggling.

(Taking my real name -Amy- in vain would be using it as a "dirty word" you see.)

Shutting up again before I hurt myself with a sharp object.

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*thinks* Actually that still wouldn't be an alliance, since the person doing the pimping wouldn't be getting much of out it, whereas in an alliance set-up there would be give and take.

That said, going with the premise - is there a difference between when you *ask* someone to pimp you and when they do it on their own without discussing it with you?

Because I've seen both of them done, and done frequently. Just curious as to where you (and others) see that line.

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Well, I, for one, never asked anyone to promote me...yet, I would take it that some other people were upset by the people who chose to promote me for their own reasons...I mean, there certainly was a lot of bitching going on within the last couple of weeks...

SO, if I was a bad guy from perhaps benefiting from the unsolicited help of an acquaintance, then that would have to make EVERYONE bad if they got promoted by friends...wouldn't it?

Or, everyone is good.

But, no, there isn't a difference, I don't think, in those who ask for it and those who just receive it...and, again, I'm saying this as someone who never asked for it....

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I would actually say there was a difference between seeking it out and receiving it without asking because it seems to speak to intent. Which is hard to gauge in the best of the circumstances. But in this case, it would be the difference, I suppose, between sitting at a bench and having a $1 blowing in the wind and end up landing at your feet, as opposed to asking someone walking by for a $1.

In your case, and in others, you just happened to be sitting in the right spot.*g*

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Perhaps you're right...but do you really think that nobody has asked for it at this point? I mean, as soon as you post the "vote for me" in your journal, you're asking for help...but I'm guessing that everyone here has solicited more than that....

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I was using your example of unsolicited help by treating it in a vaccuum of "people you ask for support" vs "people who ask others to support you".

Based on what *I've seen* most of it tends to be along the lines of "vote for me" posts that are then taken to that next step of other people taking up the call on their behalf.

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kathrynrose.livejournal.com

And neither of these situations is equivalent to an organized effort to band together to either vote for X group of people, regardless of what they write, or to vote against Y person for a strategic or personal reason beyond the writing.

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ewok-626.livejournal.com

Wow, these votes are super close! I may not last until it's over!

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After we get down to four, how many weeks afterward?

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my guess-timation is that we will have one more regular week, a vote, then the final topic/vote

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xo-kizzy-xo.livejournal.com

*looks at the poll*

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

*runs and hides because she can't stand the suspense*

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welfy.livejournal.com

This is really hard to watch! It's so close right now!

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