The How-To Girl on Rachael Ray

[WyethDigital]

http://www.howtogirl.com/Share/rr_pic.png

Please Vote for Madeline! (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/show/segments/view/youtube-stars-competition/)

I alluded to this in another post, but I wasn't allowed to go into details, due to a NDA we had to agree to.

Now that it's hit the air, I can tell you that the lovely and talented host of our podcast, Madeline, was invited to appear on the Rachael Ray show as part of a panel of YouTube beauty "experts." But that's not all! One of the YouTube panelists will be selected to be Rachael's new fashion and style buddy! Who better than a How-To Girl?

As part of the contest, you get to decide who will tape a show with Rachael as her buddy. Will it be the independent underdog Madeline, (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/show/segments/view/madeline-how-girl-merced/) or will it be someone like Bravo-supported (http://www.bravotv.com/blog/thedish/2007/09/vote_for_sledd.php) William Sledd? Only you can decide. So vote early and vote often! Voting lasts until the 18th!

Links:

See Madeline's appearance on Rachael Ray (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/show/segments/view/madeline-how-girl-merced/)

Vote for Madeline (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/show/segments/view/youtube-stars-competition/)

Read a nice article about Madeline's trip to NY to meet Rachael (http://www.madison.com/tct/news/236018)

If it weren't for the support of fans like you, I have no doubt that we could have kept up for so long, or reached so far. Thank you all!

Eric

[WWODanny]

Well, I voted. And I should be able to vote again at work tommorrow. It's always cool when decent podcasters get a few tastes of "legitimate" media.


However...I was a bit dissappointed in the thread after reading the title. I was expecting something...um...different. I guess I was being to literal.

[WyethDigital]

Thanks for the support! Onward and upward!

Eric

[EndGamePR]

Wow ... that's absolutely awesome. Good for you guys! Make sure Madeline gives you a cut of her checks when she's famous. :)

ETA: I voted, and everyone else here needs to!

[WWODanny]

Well, I voted again and I encourage everyone else to do the same!

[WyethDigital]

Thanks very much you guys! Madeline and I appreciate it!

Eric

[WyethDigital]

However...I was a bit dissappointed in the thread after reading the title. I was expecting something...um...different. I guess I was being to literal.

Ha! I just got that! Guess I need more sleep or I'm gonna keep missing the fast balls!

Eric

[Barefoot Radio.com]

Given society's preference for blondes, I think Madeline could win if she were blonde.

Cyberfolks flock to the blondes.

I just voted for Madeline.

[WyethDigital]

Given society's preference for blondes, I think Madeline could win if she were blonde.

Cyberfolks flock to the blondes.

I just voted for Madeline.

Thanks for the vote, Paul. We're trailing now, but we're putting together a couple of short packages for YouTube and our podcast to help alert people to the opportunity!

Eric

[WWODanny]

Well, I just gave you guys a pretty hard sell on the latest EVERYDAY DANNY. With my loyal listeners it should net you approximately two votes.

[WyethDigital]

Thanks a million, Danny! I'll have to check it out!

I also told Madeline about your parody of our "chocolate" video, and she thinks it sounds hilarious. I've emailed her a link.

Eric

[evilproducer]

Bumpity bump!

[evilproducer]

Bump bump bump....

[WWODanny]

Rock on! Up to 2nd place!

[WyethDigital]

For a chick that doesn't talk in her videos, that Adrienne sure is tenacious! She overtook Madi for a bit, but thankfully has fallen back again!

[WyethDigital]

Okay, so I saw on a competitor's site that someone left some tips for voting more than once. I was hoping to let our audiences decide this fair and square, especially since the contestants themselves are all really nice and I wouldn't want anyone to cheat... but apparently not everyone's fans are as honest as ours.

If you want to vote for Madeline (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/show/segments/view/youtube-stars-competition/) (or anyone else), you can either go through a proxy service (http://www.sitesurf.net/), or you can empty your cookies. Either one will let you vote more than once. I'm not recommending you do this, but I thought I'd level the playing field by making sure all the info is out there.

Happy voting.

Eric

[Metaphore]

I voted, good luck you two!

[WyethDigital]

I voted, good luck you two!

Thanks, Rev!


Eric

[WyethDigital]

If anyone wants to see the segment without dealing with the clunky Rachael Ray site, then you can visit this link (http://www.howtogirl.com/Share/Rach_Ray_Show.mov) (at least until the C and D letter arrives).

Eric

[Webzu]

Awesome Eric!! Nice to see an indy podcaster on the national scene! I've voted from my desktop and laptop. :)

[myles]

Add my Vote

[WWODanny]

FYI...The Racial Ray link isn't working.

[WyethDigital]

Hi Danny,

They have been rejiggering the site and the poll in an attempt to bring some honesty back into a totally FUBAR'd contest. A few of the contestants (namely, the HeadBangers and us) have complained about the functionality of the poll, the website, and the rotten security of the whole **** thing.

I don't know if people are trying to revote now (there was talk about resetting the votes), or if it's technical issues on RR's end. Guess we'll know soon enough. All I know is that it's really hard to connect! And just after Madeline made her plug on one of the local 5:00 PM news shows!

The plus side to all this is, win, lose or draw, we made an honest effort, stayed (mostly) above the fray, made some new friends ( :) ), and look at this as only one opportunity coming our way (there's supposed to be more coverage in the media later this fall). Oh, and I made a total whore (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sf9CE3Ki7zE) of myself (while providing lots of ammunition)!

So thanks everyone! I hope the revoting works soon! Sounds like they fixed a bunch of problems with the site!

Eric

[WyethDigital]

An Update!

Due to the complaints about... Ummmmm... irregularities in the the Rachael Ray polling process, poor site design and horrible functionality, the deadline to vote has been extended. But your votes are likely wasted.

Unfortunately, while they've improved the operation of the site, the RR Web staff is still pretty cavalier about the voting process. They see allowing people to vote more than once (much, much more than once) as American Idol-ish, without going out of their way to make sure it's actual people voting. A simple CAPTCHA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captcha) could eliminate a lot of the bot abuse and still allow people to vote more than once, if that's what they're hoping to do.

This isn't even suitable as a straight-up popularity contest, because it's got absolutely nothing to do with mobilizing your audience. All you have to do is mobilize 20 people with nothing better to do than sit around and refresh a vote page hour after hour. Or mobilize just one person to write a voting script for you. The results will be neither meaningful, nor accurate. Whether it's on purpose or not, The Rachael Ray Show has a ringer (http://www.youtube.com/user/CityVanity) on the team.

And no, it's not sour grapes because the last public view of the results showed us losing. I'm actually quite gratified with the number of votes we did get (as evidenced by our strong showing before the cheating kicked in, and by our site logs showing outgoing and incoming links to RachaelRayShow.com). The fact is, win or lose, we've got other irons in the fire than a segment on Rachael Ray. I just don't like rigged contests that generate a lot of publicity for the contest sponsor while the competitors are not respected enough to give them valid results.

Eric

[WWODanny]

Has it been specifically stated to you guys that the top vote getter gets the segment? You know, that this is going to be the only thing that determines the winner?

[WyethDigital]

Has it been specifically stated to you guys that the top vote getter gets the segment? You know, that this is going to be the only thing that determines the winner?

That's a good question. It was indicated that the voting would count the most. But there was an indication that another factor was going to depend upon them getting their message boards up and running, where fans of RR could ask questions of specific contestants, and based upon how well they did, that it could factor in somehow. They were kind of vague, thinking back about it. But so far the message boards have not materialized, and they've hidden the vote percentages, so they can pretty much just choose who the hell they want.

Eric

[Webzu]

You must be right about the ringer since it doesn't look like she has even posted a video on you tube since August of 2006...WTF? Four videos and no updates in over a year and she's on a national TV show as a you tuber? I find that a more disturbing than your video Eric. :p

[WyethDigital]

You must be right about the ringer since it doesn't look like she has even posted a video on you tube since August of 2006...WTF? Four videos and no updates in over a year and she's on a national TV show as a you tuber? I find that a more disturbing than your video Eric. :p
And that's pretty disturbing! :)

I've got my theories about the whole thing, but I'll hold off on discussing them further (publicly) until the whole process has burned itself out and we've gone as far as we can... Should be interesting to see if my theory plays out, and if it does, then I'll post my thoughts and lay out my case.

Eric

[WyethDigital]

Bumping above the SPAM.

The Rachael Ray "Ask a YouTube Star" message boards (http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/club/board/show/40/) are now open! I'll have to register and "Ask Adrienne" what bot she's using to flood the vote...

Eric

[WyethDigital]

Bumping to bury spam.

[WyethDigital]

the graciousness, you said make sense very much 云南旅游昆明旅游丽江旅游昆明旅行社

You suck, spammer toad!

Eric

[myjoni444]

Just an observation; I was wondering if anyone else noticed when Rachael put potatoes in the oven. She put them on the bottom shelf - the turkey breast had already been in there - and actually touched the shelf to nudge it up a bit to allow the potatoes to fit. This struck me as odd because the oven had been on and was supposedly hot. I was just wondering if anyone else saw it.

http://www.rachaelrayweb.com/gallery/2.jpg