Talk:Carly Smithson

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[edit] Rationale for article

Though long-standing Wikipedia precedent is that contestants normally don't get articles until the finalist stage unless they had articles before (Joanne Borgella already had an article based on her modeling career, but I myself enforced the precedent on the Kristy Lee Cook article), this is an exception because:

  • Smithson's prior major-label album, Ultimate High, has had an article since 2005 (and at present makes no direct mention of AI); her name at the time (Carly Hennessy) had been a redirect to that album since 2006 (I changed it to a redirect to this article--edit: after someone else changed it to redirect to the AI7 article).
  • Though a similar situation with Robbie Carrico wasn't enough to avoid the redirect (his previous band is pretty trivial), the controversy surrounding Smithson's previous work (especially the article about its failure in The Wall Street Journal at that time--years before AI) is sufficient additional notoriety to overcome the precedent, as it was with Frenchie Davis and Antonella Barba.

--RBBrittain (talk) 05:21, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

I should also note that I deleted all redlinks from the AI7 article semifinalist list, and added "no link" comments to the semifinalist lists in both that article and the main American Idol article, to discourage further proliferation of articles. --RBBrittain (talk) 05:59, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
I agree here, an article is warranted even without considering American Idol. Another who had a pre-existing article (cut in the top 50) is Natashia Williams (Natashia Blach on the show). I created redirects (not linked except on disambiguation pages where necessary) for the remaining top 24 contestants for easy finding. David Archuleta and Michael Johns will have to add (singer) to the end as articles for others with their name already exist, and David Cook will need additional modifiers as there are two other singers with articles with that name (I went with (American Idol singer) for the redirect). CrazyC83 (talk) 23:15, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] POV

Sounds like some crazed VOTW members are trying to taint the competition. The fact that her record was disclosed on the show is true, I am REMOVING the so called "source" #2. If you watched Hollywood "Week", you would have paid attention and listened carefully to what they were talking about. --68.97.75.170 (talk) 06:48, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Good call. Votefortheworst is NOT a reliable source. --WoohookittyWoohoo! 05:43, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
How is Vote for the Worst a "non-reliable" source when references whatever information they find and/or have actual pictures and then OTHER news sources reference them? If references sources and/or being used as a reference for other "reliable" sources makes you unreliable, then what does that say about wikipedia? What would be the point for all this here?LittleMatchGirl (talk) 00:57, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hit in Ireland?

I read somewhere that, despite her failure in the US, she did have a hit single in Ireland. Can anybody verify this? Corvus cornixtalk 23:40, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Citizenship??

Does anyone know what her current citizenship is?

Because she is on American Idol, and she is from Ireland. Triage (talk) 01:32, 6 March 2008 (UTC)


She is married to an American so either she now has a work VISA or her citizenship.. not sure though, but she would need one of the other to be on the show. Wish I was more help.LittleMatchGirl (talk) 01:00, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Yep. Especially since they've made a rather large deal about her not being able to get a Visa in 2006. --WoohookittyWoohoo! 07:15, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] wrong birthdate

I believe the birthdate submitted on this site is incorrect. Carly was born September 26th, not September 12th. Epicatsea (talk) 03:46, 10 March 2008 (UTC) epicatsea

HELLOOO!!!! on AI she said she was born september 12th!!! if she saysz it, then its the right day!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.198.67.30 (talk) 02:25, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] whats so bad about her having an album before

I still don't get whats so "bad" about her having an album before and now coming onto American Idol. Can someone answer this question? Im just asking this because it says that under controversial on the American Idol page.

The argument is that American Idol is supposed to be a competition for breakout singers, not those who've made and album and 'had their chance' already. However, I do not agree with this. Even if they've had an album, it did not do well, so they still may need something like Idol to give them a boost. Simon Cowell has also expressed his oppinion in this way. Plus, many of this year's (Season 7) Top 10 have albums. ("Songs From the Attic", Brooke White; "Devoted", Kristy Lee Cook (Released under the name 'Kristy Lee'); "Ultimate High", Carly Smithson; "Rolling", Film (Michael John's first band); "Future Unknown", The Rising (Michael John's second band); "Fear vs. Faith (feat. David Archuleta)", Merrick Christensen (Christensen played the instruments and Archuleta sang, as I understand), "Analog Heart", David Cook (there is controversy over whether this is actually him). So as you can see, if Carly were to be removed from the show because she already has an album, so would have been our winner, runner-up, and several other finalists. 75.181.60.225 (talk) 22:00, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Not a girl... not yet a woman

I see somebody's changed the reference to "girls" to "women"... more accurate, certainly, and more politically correct to feminists, but doesn't the Idol show itself refer to "girls" and "guys" as their preferred terminology? *Dan T.* (talk) 18:36, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

First of all, nice title =P.
Secondly, yes they do. That's exactly why I had put it that way to begin with. But Aspects decided it was more PC, I'm assuming, since the majority of the contestants are older, to list them with more proper terminology...I guess. Frankly, I'm fine either way. Maybe it was since I listed "men" as "boys". But this is how they list them on the public restrooms, so perhaps he's doing SOMETHING right XD.--Cinemaniac86Oy_gevalt. 23:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
From Wiktionary's entry for girl: Calling a grown woman a "girl" may be considered either a compliment or an insult, depending on context and sensibilities. [1] Personally, I agree that adult females (i.e., 18 years or older) should be referred to as women on Wikipedia. American Idol is a television show, not an encyclopedia, and is free to use whatever terminology it likes. Quacks Like a Duck (talk) 13:31, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] RfC: Does Smithson have a son, and can anyone find a reference?

Conflict over whether or not Smithson has a son, as stated by IP User:64.228.202.38 here, here, here, and here. I can't revert any more per WP:3RR, so I'd like some third opinions. None of the references in the article state that Smithson has a son, and a google search revealed nothing but speculation about recent pregnancy. Tan | 39 02:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

  • As far as I know, she hasn't. And unless it can be sourced, it shouldn't be in the article. Just remove it. 3RR does not apply in this case. --Fritz S. (Talk) 07:28, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I agree with Fritz S. WP:BLP trumps when an IP randomly inserts wholly untrue information that cannot be substantiated.--Esprit15d • talk • contribs 12:42, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks a ton. Removing RfC tag. Tan | 39 14:23, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carly's MySpace?

Does anyone know if this Myspace link is actually official? Almost all the other top 12 contestants have pages that look exactly the same. Just a blank page and a link to their contestant page. Lovepopp (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 16:03, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the link that was in the article is her real MySpace profile. It had been public before, but was changed to private when it was announced that she was on Idol. --Fritz S. (Talk) 19:34, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Order of performance in chart

Who cares whether she was 1, 2, 3, etcetera? Do we have anything that says this is important to anyone? 71.139.15.189 (talk) 06:02, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

It simply was a fact that they performed in this spot. It helps for people who are researching the show and curious as to the order of events. Let's say someone was writing an article about Season 7's Top 12 night. They were asked to review the show from start to finish. It's important to know the order. Plus, in addition to that, it's significant statistically. If someone wanted to compile mathematical data about the likelihood of appearing in the bottom in correlation with appearing in the first half of the show, our charts will be of use. And since we're an encyclopedia, it's valid ^_^.--Cinemaniac86Oy_gevalt. 18:33, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Controversy

This article should cover the fact that Randy Jackson worked at MCA while Carly was signed there, yet she didn't get booted off the show, like contestant Thomas Lowe who was booted for being on a label that Cowell worked at. --Erroneuz1 (talk) 06:41, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Tone of controversy section

It's written as if it's a BIASED and spirited rebuttal against each of Carly's defenses/excuses for why her album didn't do well by a non-fan. Hardly wiki quality.Mightdaysofmoseos (talk) 04:20, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV Check

A lot of this page looks like it was written by fans in a biased manner. It seems the article is nothing but rebuttals to all of the critics questions about her, rather than an unbiased look at both sides. So I want to start a NPOV check so we can get some non-interested observers to take a look. A few examples, (all unsourced as well):

- "The album did not have the opportunity to find an audience"

- "Figures surrounding the album have been consistently misrepresented"

- "Claims that MCA Records spent over $2 million on the production and promotion of Smithson's album were widely used to discredit her American Idol competition"

- "Many American Idol fans purported..."

- "For whatever reason, these other Idols' with professional pasts were not recipients of similar negative press"

- "she excelled in the competition until her shocking elimination"

- "considered to be one of the top three competitors"

  • this is worded slightly wrong but during Hollywood week Simon said that she was one of the top 3 VOCALISTS in the season....by the way I love her=D* —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.248.193.99 (talk) 03:12, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Unrelated, but the article also needs some cleaning up, especially the Personal life section. James (talk) 16:39, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] checked out the above issues, thought i'd share

I'm researching articles that have been questioned for fun....


I don't know where i'm supposed to comment on the neutrality of this article, but I thought this might be a good place to do it. I looked at Michael Johns wikipedia and a lot of the information in teh American Idol Controversy section was clearly picked up from someone who looked at Carly Smithson's site and just took some of the same info, but his site hasn't been questioned for neutrality. How does one go about doing that, because that site isn't neutral at all.

NOTE TO ABOVE. The information from the controversy section was copied and pasted onto Carly's page from Michael Johns page (not vice versa). The article regarding the vote tallies that is cited on this page came out on 4/23 and referenced Michael Johns, she was eliminated that evening. Need better sources if using phrases like "unprecendented" reaction. Many articles called it "another shocking" or "surprising" elimination, and she had been in the bottom three before. That all may be why the neutrality is being called in to question here.

Also, i thought it would be kind of fun to check on all the claims here listed above and the first claim - "The album did not have the opportunity to find an audience" appears factual. Apparantly, the record company had a big break down when there was some sort of big buy out and merger of the companies. Something like 3,000 artists were virtually shelved or set out to pasture. The records that were finished already were released (some of them), but basically just released into the market, without any publicity, help, marketing, etc. It was really interesting reading to find about about MCA and all this trouble. Apparantly, it was quite a sad time for a lot of record companies and for the record industry. A lot of small labels were sucked into the parent company and are no more, leaving less room for smaller artists to find an audience, i think.

Anyway, based on my reading the next two claims - "Figures surrounding the album have been consistently misrepresented" & - "Claims that MCA Records spent over $2 million on the production and promotion of Smithson's album were widely used to discredit her American Idol competition" is also true. Apparantly, this figure includes some girl named Danielle Brisebois' publishing contract for the year; but this girl didn't just contribute to Carly Smithson's album but to a whole lot of artists for the label. It also includes the production team's salaries, but that team worked on 12 other albums that year, so, obviously, for some reason, a lot of individuals seem to have some trouble with this Smithson person (who i've never even seen perform and isn't even famous) and have bloated facts and numbers.

The other claims have sources, and i found quite a few sources that stated the other Idols' professional history and I will add a source in there, since some people don't like to use votefortheworst.com.

Anyway, this was fun and i hope i helped in discussing the article's info! Thanks and keep our free encyclopedia truthful guys! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.169.225.221 (talk) 21:35, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carly's past

I just wanted to explain myself here. The reason why I've removed the content about Carly's past is that the sourcing is faulty. A Yahoo Music blog and Vote for the Worst are not reliable sources and that is critical for a biography of a living person. If you can find a reliable source, great. Otherwise, the information shouldn't be included. --WoohookittyWoohoo! 07:54, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

I also removed what amounted to an essay about Carly getting hit harder than the other contestants who had pro backgrounds. This might be true but it was very poorly sourced and what was sourced didn't hold up once you removed the unsourced information. --WoohookittyWoohoo! 08:02, 28 May 2008 (UTC)