PureDWTS 18, Week 2 Partner Switch Twitter Voting: Is It “Rigged?” Part II *24 Hour Update*
So the partner switch voting has been going on for 24 hours now, and some interesting patterns are starting to emerge from the data we’ve culled together on Keyhole (with some help from our gracious readers!). Before we get into it, though, let me emphasize: the goal here is not to alter the outcome of the partner switch by sharing info. Contrary to what one nutjob on the ABC boards thinks, we are not “conspiring & strategizing” in our private members area to “sabotage” the partner switch…Conrad & Co. are doing a great job sabotaging the show by themselves. They sure don’t need my help 😛 But hey, thanks for flattering me by implying that we here at Pure have a TON of power, random ABC board cretin – I think I’ll use my superpowers to go find that missing plane now, then maybe end the conflict in Syria and spoil the ending to Sunday’s Walking Dead season finale for all to see. BRB…
Anywho, the goal is just to see if TPTB are being honest with us about the results of the switch-up voting – that’s it. I really don’t care one way or another who gets paired with whom, because odds are that most of them are going to end up back with their original partners in a week or 2, anyway. So with that in mind, I would kindly ask that any of you doing hashtag analyses along with us NOT share specific results in the comments. I’ll share some broad, general details for how the voting is going, but I’m not gonna mention specific pairings. Gonna try to keep it as fair as I can, kids.
So first things first – anyone else find it awfully funny that they suddenly decided to allow voting for the partner switch on the ABC site last night? After it had been advertised as a “Twitter-voting” contest? And not long after I posted part I of my “Is it Rigged?” post? 😛 I can only guess that it was an attempt to both appease the non-Twitter crowd, as well as play spoiler to our efforts to track the hashtags. Too bad that a lot of the folks voting on the ABC site are also using that handy-dandy “share my vote on Twitter” button to tell us how they voted…and good ol’ Keyhole seems to be picking that up as well. Nice try, Muppets/Mean Girls…*maniacal laugh* ::horns::
Speaking of those “look who I voted for!” tweets – you notice how they have spaces in them? Yeah, Heidi & I theorized that it’s because they don’t want it to show up as a hashtag (hashtags don’t have spaces), because then it would essentially count as voting twice – go vote on the website, then click the “share my vote on Twitter” button and it would spit out another hashtag that would essentially count as a second vote. Some of you also noticed that the press release listed all the hashtags with spaces in them – this is WRONG and if you’re copying it, you’re wasting your time. The lovably dorky IT guy in my office explained it to me like this: the # symbol basically tells Twitter “read everything to the right of this with no spaces”. The minute you put a space in, you’re cutting off the hashtag – so instead of voting #DWTSMerylVal, Twitter is only reading it as #DWTSMeryl which doesn’t fit the pattern and won’t count towards anything. Sorry kids 🙂 Listen to the Berge – not the pion typing up the press release with no idea how hashtags work. 😉
Other things I’m seeing people doing wrong? Voting for eliminated pros or pros that aren’t even on this season. Sorry, but I don’t see TPTB bringing Karina back to dance with Charlie while a pro that is still in the competition has to sit out during switch week. I realize that she was still available to vote for on the ABC site last night after the east coast airing wrapped, but I’m guessing that was to avoid spoiling the results of the show for the west coasters who may have logged on. She has since been removed as an option on the site, so I doubt she’s fair game as a legitimate choice for the partner switch. Ditto for pros who aren’t even on this season – you may be trying to send a message to TPTB by tweeting #DWTSMerylTristan all day long, but if they’re only monitoring hashtags of legitimate possibilities for the switch up, then they probably won’t see it, anyway. While I would love to see Karina dancing with Charlie (and she was in the lead in tweets pairing her with Charlie, prior to her being eliminated) or see Tristan back on the show in any capacity this season – it just ain’t gonna happen. Tweet however you want – but just don’t get your hopes up.
Also noticed that voting for same-sex pairings has been rendered impossible on the site, so I guess #DWTSJamesDerek is a no-go. Sorry to the 3 people that tweeted that one…yeah, none of the same sex pairings really had much traction to begin with.
Now onto the actual voting – I’m actually a bit surprised that there hasn’t been more traffic. Even the three hashtags with the most traffic haven’t even broken the 5K mark yet – can’t tell if Keyhole just isn’t picking up on everything (doubtful), or if people just aren’t really on board with this Twitter voting thing. Heidi & I both noticed that they seemed to very quickly and vaguely gloss over it on the show last night, and it wasn’t exactly clear when the voting actually started, so people may not have really understood what they had to do and when they had to do it. There’s also the fact that it lasts for AN ENTIRE WEEK, so maybe the sense of urgency to vote just isn’t there…and then there’s the fact that people may have just decided to use the website. Who knows – there’s still 5 days left to vote, so there’s plenty of time for those numbers to grow.
There’s already some clear frontrunners on a few of the pairings, and I’m finding those three to be pretty predictable. There’s also some pairings that are getting little to no traffic, and one or two pros that aren’t getting tweeted about much – my guess is that the voting is not going to perfectly match everyone up (especially since fans of some of the pros are all going after the same two celeb partners – I’m sure you can guess who), so there’s going to be a pro or two that ends up with “whatever’s left” after all of the other couples are matched up based on votes. This could result in some rather interesting pairings. And keep in mind, too, that assuming there’s an elimination on Monday night – the partnerships could get totally messed up if someone that was leading in votes for a certain partner were to suddenly be eliminated. The balance of power could shift in a heartbeat. Sounds so dramatic, doesn’t it? 🙂
Also worth noting: the competition for the female celebs is much tighter than it is for the male celebs. While I think the female celeb-male pro partnerships have (to some degree) already been decided, the door seems wide open for the male celeb-female pro partnerships. Should be interesting to see if the tides turn at all on those.
So there’s your “24 hours later” snapshot of what’s going on with the Twitter voting. What do you guys think so far? Do you have any initial predictions to who might get paired up? Still confused by the Twitter voting? You can check out this post and this post. Tell us what you think! 🙂
I’m noticing people need more direction on how to….word the tweets. I am seeing a lot, I mean a lot of #DWTS @ProTwittername CelebFullName
Those ten seconds they spent on it during the show last night helped oh so much!
Their instruxtions were clear as mud
Can we predict NOW that TPTB, will say the system failed, and there will be no switch-a-roo!
If “the special” rematches are getting traction, and others are not, this once again becomes one of Conrad Green’s Circus Side Shows, fun for children of all ages. I mean those who TWIT (initially) and when that failed, fun for the REAL DEMOGRAPHIC to vote at ABC.
I am so over this crap! Let’s just dance people, with the one who brung ya’!
You know what I did when I went and voted using the ABC Switch Up app on their website? Before I posted my tweet, I took out the spaces between the DWTS and the celeb & pro’s names 😀 Will that screw up TPTB’s manupilations? Heh
In my timeline, because I basically follow Derek fans 😉 I see Meryl/Derek and Amy/Mark
They’ve really screwed things up with the site thing by putting spaces in. I don’t know what to think of this anymore. I can’t wait until this switch thing is over. And to think: after they dance, we have to vote again like this to get them returned to their original partners. uggh
I just can’t see this twitter vote working. And this voting for a week is ridiculous! I could see a couple of days but a whole week?
I think the idea of a switch is interesting but not the way they are going about it. And don’t even get me started with having to vote to get the original pairings back.
By the way, has anyone made a drinking game up? I’m beginning to think it might be the only way to get through this season.
The switch is a terrible idea and I think in some way it’s going to blow up in TPTB faces. But they insist on doing it anyway. @dancewithyou, it wouldn’t surprise me if that happened. But I think it’s so wrong to have to vote to get them back with their original partners. Dance the one week with the one and then everyone automatically goes back to their original and be done with it. If I was one of the celebrities dancing this season, that’s what I would expect and I would be upset if it didn’t happen. And then there’s the celebrities watching this and thinking I’m glad I’m not doing this show. It’s another thing that’s going to make it harder to get anyone to agree to do the show.
@Vogue we vote? I thought the celebs decided if they go back to the original pro or stay with the new one?
@Kelly I did the same thing…great minds…;-)
Using the ABC Switch Up app, if you leave in the white spaces, will your vote still count? I did some with and without the spaces. What a mess.
@Jara The ABC web site doesn’t count your vote when you tweet it but when you pick from the pull down menu. It’s weird and complicated. The best way to vote really is direct tweeting on Twitter. ABC does the space thing so the vote doesn’t get counted twice. Really direct tweeting it is the best way to go.
#SwitchupTrainwreck
The Glitter Muppets have successfully dorked-up the voting (gee what a surprise). 🙄 I used to be disgusted, now I’m just amused. 😛
My main concern, now, is getting everyone back where they belong after this fiasco is over.
Vogue, do we have any *reliable* intel that says we have to vote to reconstitute the original pairings? We’ve had so much conflicting info on this whole farce. I’ve got my fingers and toes crossed that we DO NOT have to go through all this again to get the couples back together.
Cindy, I absolutely agree that this season’s foolishness is going to make it even harder for TPTB to get anyone other than really desperate “publicityw*ores” to sign up for future seasons.
Thanks Cher. So are they going to add the votes placed directly on twitter with those placed on the ABC app? I have a twitter account, rarely used it and I’m not sure I recall how to direct tweet :0)
Courtney, It’s a moot point, but I’d like you to speculate wildly (if you’re willing) on whether you think the voting for who gets the men (particularly Charlie) would *not* be so close if Karina was still in the game. I felt that at a lot of viewers would have put Charlie with Karina because she’s considered by many to be a strong choreographer.
@Cidra – I don’t think there would be a snowball’s chance in hell of any other female pro (except maybe Cheryl) getting Charlie if Karina was still in this thing…she was already leading the other female pros by a good amount before she got voted off on Monday night. Now that she’s out, though – it’s a much more open race. Still think the female pro that’s currently in the lead will end up with him, but there’s still 5 days left to vote…
Thanks, Court. *sigh* I really wish Karina was still in the mix.
Because I’m still getting a lot of questions on Twitter, this is the last time I’m going to say it: THERE. ARE. NO. SPACES. IN. HASHTAGS. I do not care what the ABC press release says, I do not care what the site makes you tweet, I do not care what Cheryl says. If there is a space between the names, it’s going to cut off the second one, which makes ZERO sense. Again, tweet however you want – but it’s clear that TPTB do not know what they’re talking about, because it is infinitely more difficult to track the partner switch tweeting that way than it is with standard, spaceless hashtags. Because the bulk of the DWTS viewing audience is likely not Twitter-savvy, of course they’re not going to even think to question what TPTB are saying – and part of me thinks that’s almost intentional. But whatever – tweet with spaces, tweet without spaces, I’m not gonna lose any sleep over it. Just trying to help, guys…
Well I am not even bothering to vote because I think this is a terrible ploy on the part of TPTB and I don’t have a twitter and I am not going to get one, plus I am way too lazy to go to ABC to vote and my one little vote is not going to change anything. I just think this is way too confusing for some folks of a certain age, like me, haha!!
I honestly think the switch is a great idea, and that it will be interesting and entertaining to watch no matter what. It will really give certain pros an opportunity to really blossom. Give Derek a cow and she will look good with him:-) If Meryl is given to him she will be brilliant, and the differences between Maks and Derek will be clarified! I cannot wait!!!
I don’t think they would humiliate themselves by acknowledging the switch failed. It’s not in the DNA.
I think another reason why you haven’t tracked down that many tweets so far is the fact that probably many people are tweeting with spaces and #DWTS as only hashtag. I know you don’t want that discussion but as you said, the hashtag ends if you put a space in (I think that’s obvious), but I can very well imagine that they only want the DWTS-hashtag, so that they only have to track down that one and then analyze each content…but of course that’s only my guess and no idea what they’re using, but they’re for sure provided with super professional technology. I’m really not hating on the switch, but I just wish TPTB could have come up with a better voting system…it’s just so confusing!
The space in the hashtag makes no sense and makes for a very labor intensive way to count the tags – instead of just monitoring the traffic on each hashtag individually, they would have to cull together everything with the #dwts hashtag, then do a search for all the tweets that contained a celeb name and a pro name, and then find a way to filter out all the tweets that clearly weren’t meant to be a vote for the partner switch. For example, just doing a basic search for the #dwts hashtag and then a subsearch for a pro or celeb name, a tweet like “I’m only watching #dwts to see Meryl and Derek!” would get spit back as a vote for Meryl & Derek, even though the tweet is clearly about something else. The spaces simply DO NOT MAKE SENSE.
I’ll admit that I haven’t been tracking in detail what’s happening with all the changes, voting, etc. However, I wondered today if they did a double elimination so that they didn’t have to eliminate anyone after the switch-a-roo. That way they avoid the question of which pro is eliminated when the switch-a-roo happens. They just do a non-elimination and then go back to their old pros for the rest of the season.
Just an idea.
Audrey if they have the money to pay someone to individually go through the #DWTS and manually count votes then they have more money than Bill Gates and China combined. Besides, there is too much risk in human error doing it like that. The no spaces hash tag can be counted automatically, without a human sitting there doing it.
so true what you’re saying about hashtags, but I think many people are doing it with spaces/only #dwts (and if memory serves the official instruction is also with spaces?? but maybe they will just count both??)
and on another note, I really hope Val won’t get Meryl! Haven’t looked it up yet, but a friend told me she saw two single accounts tweeting like crazy for Val/Meryl(apparently the tweets are numbered and with spaces)…I’m pretty sure Derek is way more popular than any other pro, but I’m not sure if all his fans want Meryl or if they bother that much for the switch and the confusing twitter vote.
@Nancy I’m with you and not bothering to waste my time voting. It will turn out the way it will turn out. I’m so sick of this season already with all the childish rivalries that TPTB are trying to make us believe are going on. I say just let them dance like they use to in the good old days. Enough with the gimmicks. jmo
John (#22), That was my thinking too — do the double elimination so you don’t have an elimination on switcher-oo week. Of course that shows far more consideration toward the celebs/pros than TPTB have demonstrated of late. The speculation that they were just taking the opportunity to get rid of Sean seems more like them. That said, I’m going to continue to hope for no elimination when the pairs are all switched-up.
I’ve been thinking about how they can “rig” the voting while still making it appear legitimate and I wonder how they are actually going to pair the couples. Are they pairing pros with stars, stars with pros or just making a big long list of pairings from highest to lowest totals? I think they could come up with three totally different results depending on how they do this. Courtney maybe you know whether the actual numbers you are seeing could come up with different results.
For example say the the totals look like this:
Derek/Meryl 300,000
Derek/Danica 200,000
Derek/NeNe 100,000
If they pair the pros with the stars, obviously Derek gets Meryl in this example. But say NeNe gets less than 100,000 votes with all the other pros. If they pair stars with pros, she gets Derek. If they make one long list of all the possible pairs by total votes, Derek could miss out on all three people, if Meryl, Danica and NeNe get just one more vote with another pro than with Derek.
I’m not even sure TPTB care about who is paired with whom, but if they do, I’ll be curious if they ever explain how they did this. (Why am I even wondering. Of course they won’t.)
Personally I think all they want is the chatter and the possible viewers it might bring in. Additionally I think maybe they were pretty sneaky in setting up the ABC app to tweet out pairings with a space after #DWTS. Apparently Nielsen Twitter ratings are getting to be a big deal now and I’m not sure if Nielsen would pick up DWTS hastags if they had names attached to them.
I have a question— my twitter account is set to private,so will my votes still be counted?
I don’t trust Mr. Green and TPTB with the switch gimmick. They are going to pull something funny…maybe. I have a feeling they will let the couples know who the audience picked for the switch -up and then let them have the final say… and none of them will switch. IF they do this, I believe viewers will be livid. Oh and BTW… the ratings are still down, go figure.
I wonder how many fans read the celebs tweets because before last Mondays show Amy did a q and a and said she would want Mark twice for the switch up. If ppl. are seeing this I doubt they would go against her wish and try to give her someone else.
“There’s already some clear frontrunners on a few of the pairings, and I’m finding those three to be pretty predictable.” – Hmmm, I guess Im just clueless because the only predictable pairing I can think of is Meryl and Derek.
I too am not bothering to vote for any switch. It is too complicated and I don’t really care who has who at this point.
I am concerned about Derek getting Meryl. She will be traveling to Florida the first week of April for the Stars on Ice tour. The first show is the 4th and they meet a day or two early to choreograph new numbers. With all the projects he has will he be able to go with her?
I’m the mature, Non-Twitter-savy gal who had previously asked for clarification/help with Twitter voting. When I logged onto the ABC/DWTS page to do my weekly voting and saw the ABC ‘Switch-Up’ voting page I thought – HOORAY! (insert Happy Dance here) – this will be easy-peasy … And getting those ABC online Twitter votes WAS indeed a snap. But now, after reading all your comments, I’m completely confuzzled over hashtags – with or without white spaces – and wonder if any of my (or other) votes will even count … and ultimately – what in blue blazes is REALLY going on??
My laundry list of ‘WHAT? – HUH? – and HOW did you figure THAT out?’ is way too long to even begin to tackle … so can I just say after reading all your comments/explanations … my seasoned nose is catching a whiff of ABC/RAT somewhere in this mess!!!
WHY are they even doing this? Is it just another manipulation by the infamous PTB … or possibly the Nielsen/Twitter thing – keeping DWTS trending? (isn’t that what they call it??)
Bottom line – who does this benefit most? … and why?
One last thought about the dancing thus far … with the exception of Derek’s work I’ve been disappointed (very, in some cases) in most of the pro’s choreography. I think some of the celebs have the potential to be brilliant on the dance floor, but haven’t come close as yet … so I’m hoping the pros get their act together soonest and amp up their routines.
Karen, I’m not sure that it makes a difference if they pair star with pro or pro with star as there seems to be only one logical way to do it (which means they won’t do it, but whatever). You look at all the possible combinations of Male pro and female star – Whichever combination gets the most votes is the first pair. Whichever combination gets the next highest votes (minus the pro of the first pair) is the next pair. So, for example, if Derek is the highest vote getter with Meryl with 100,000 votes, he dances with Meryl. If Derek has the next highest number of votes with, say, Candace – obviously he can’t dance with her, so the next highest number of votes is Maks with Danica with 75,000 votes, he dances with Danica. Then the next highest number of votes is Mark with Amy, so he dances with her….and on down the line. I don’t know of any other way they can do it and have it mean what they claim to want. By vote totals of all the combinations together.
Now, a pro is going to be eliminated between now and the actual pair up. Someone told me they announce it live on the 7th. Does that mean they’ll have been rehearsing together all week and them dance on the 7th? Or does it mean that they announce the new pairs on the 7th to dance the following week. So, in reality, they could lose TWO men between now and the actual switch dance. To top it off, who are they counting? Maks or Maksim?? It’s all fucked up. Frankly, if they are going to use an off-hand Derek idea from years ago, perhaps they should have asked him how to do it as well. Hell, I’m pretty sure that Derek mentioned it during All Stars when everyone was bitching about him and Shawn – or maybe it was when he was dancing with Nicole – I only remember that he suggested it in response to a lot of bitching about his partner….so that doesn’t really narrow it down. 🙂
I do think Heidi…they can use the excuse that you described in terms of culling through all the #DWTS hashtag to gather the information. This would allow them to make any changes they want to make to the pairings. Now it might have been a honest mistake initially…however I think they will use it for their purposes.
And in response to using Derek’s idea from a few seasons ago. I think they had bigger plans for Derek this season than just being a pro. Derek alluded to it when he talked about being the Creative Director of the Macy’s Stars of Dance and of course he choreographed that thing on GMA. So I wonder if when Derek agreed to be a pro perhaps some things were perhaps lost in translation. I don’t know…just guessing.
One thing for sure, I agree with you it is an unfixable mess now. I think you are right it was during the All Star Season. I remember it as an off the cuff statement.
PH, #34, I agree the most logical way is exactly what you say. Make a long list of all the pairs from highest to lowest total votes and pair them from top to bottom on that list, scratching off pairings that are impossible since the pro is already taken. Of course by the time we get toward the bottom of that list some of the stars are going to get their third or fourth most popular pairing unless the numbers work out amazingly well but I’m sure the show won’t get into that.
I do see however how the show could make the other two ways seem logical if they have a trick up their sleeve. Using my example from before:
Derek/Meryl 300,000
Derek/Danica 200,000
Derek/NeNe 100,000
I could see the show bringing out Derek and saying, “Derek after totaling the fan votes, they want to see you dance with…Meryl”. Then they would bring out all the rest of the pros one at a time.
If, on the other hand, they want to start with stars, they could bring out NeNe and say, “NeNe after totaling the fan votes, they want to see you dance with…Derek”, assuming she got more votes with Derek than any other pro.
Of course, all those results could change depending on which star they want to start with for the pairings. In my example above, if they started with Danica they would end up with different results, all vaguely justifiable. In other words, as always they can do just about whatever they want, lol.
Now for my theory of the day. They did a double elimination last week. My first thought was they did that so they wouldn’t have to do an elimination when they had the switched up couples. Now I think it was so they don’t have to do an elimination this Monday, March 31. Julianne on Instagram posted that she’s judging, as we knew, on April 7 and she’s under the impression she is there for the switch week, although even she didn’t seem positive, lol. That means they will announce the pairs this Monday. If they eliminate a pair they have a big old mess on their hands. What do they do with the now unmatched pro and star, whose switch partners have just been sent home? My tin foil hat theory is they plan to do an elimination of a switched up couple (on April 14 based on the April 7 switch dances), and in the process they can reassign some pro to someone they want to keep around, and I’m not talking about putting Derek with Meryl. I’m thinking more along the lines of the show wanting to dump Witney as Cody’s partner and giving him someone like Emma, who seems really popular?? So maybe give Witney to Billy Dee, who might be about ready to leave by then? I can’t believe CAI’s awkward comment meant nothing.
Of course there is still the problem of what are they going to do with the possible elimination on April 7, based on the next Monday’s dancing. Are they going to eliminate at the end of the night a pro and star who aren’t even standing together, since they just finished dancing with their switched up partners? If they do, won’t that make a total mess unless everyone just goes back to their original partners the next week?
Basically they have messed up eliminations and voting for four weeks, and that doesn’t even take into consideration the additional messy weeks they will create if the rumor about switch back voting is true.
Karen, I don’t think they will announce the twitter pairings on Monday, because if I’m correct, the twitter voting doesn’t end until midnight on Monday, after the show is over. So, they can still eliminate someone (and most likely will) then. Then, they will have time to fiddle with the results to get the pairings they have predetermined, and announce to everyone Tuesday morning who they’re dancing with…. And will let it be a big surprise to people who don’t go to places like here. 🙂 I think, and am probably wrong, is that if they don’t eliminate someone one week, it’ll be that week. I also sort of feel that they really didn’t plan a double elimination until shortly before the show…. (and I could be wrong with that, too)
Here is my guess on what they are going to do.
I think they are going to do an elimination next week. They already know who is lowest, voting in the normal respect ended on Tuesday. They just will throw out all switch up votes related to that particular celeb and pro and then go from there to make the 9 switch pairings left.
I also think the will do an elimination at the end of the show the Monday of the switch dances (Week 4) and it will be based on Week 3 dancing and scores, which means the original pair with the lowest total votes and scores getter celeb and partner goes home. But, since they are all switched up for the dances on Week 4, they need to wait until the very end for results to avoid confusion.
Then, I think they will NOT do an elimination on Week 5, which is based on the votes from Switch Up Week 4. I think they might possibly take votes for the celeb received on Week 4 (Meryl/Derek votes for example, would go to Meryl/Maks) and combine them with votes from Week 5 when the original pairings are back, to get the results for the elimination on Week 6. Or they could throw out votes from the switch week altogether.
I’m going to guess that the pairings that seem obvious already are Meryl/Derek, Amy/Mark and Danica/Maks. Just a guess, not trying to sway voters, I am not even on twitter and am not going to vote for the switch pairings. I do agree that which pro the guy celebs will be with, even Charlie, is a much harder thing to predict.
Oh, that’s right Lori, they won’t announce the pairings for switch up until Tuesday morning. But, still doesn’t change how the eliminations I laid out will work.
I really do think the show will end up being super-dramatic about whether the new pairings are permanent, but in the end, they will only be for one week because all the celebs will want to go back to their original pros.
Thanks Lori. I didn’t realize the voting went until midnight Monday, so the announcement will be after the eliminations. They can just adjust the results. That makes sense.
I think it was Derek’s very polite way of saying “You think I got the best partner? Let’s switch and see what YOU can do with her. And what I can do with your partner.” 🙂
After that press release, I’m wondering if they are going to try and keep the new pairings under wraps until the show on April 7.
Only problem with doing that, Karen T, is that myself and Courtney aren’t the only ones watching the twitter hashtag trackers and we KNOW when someone is a good pairing or not. And let me tell you, there are a couple that are EXTREMELY obvious. Unless they don’t mind intensifying the shit storm, that is. And that’s all I’ll say about that. 🙂
LesleyB, I also wonder if TPTB are going to not reveal the new pairings until the night they perform together. For me that’s silly because with all the paps hanging around the studio and Meryl and Charlie traveling with Stars on Ice, it wouldn’t be hard to figure out who was dancing with whom. However, most of the DWTS audience doesn’t really follow what’s happening with the show except on Monday night. So I guess for most viewers it would be an “exciting revelation”. 🙄
There are too many eyes tracking Twitter hashtags (and it’s not just our eyes…gee, wonder where those other people got the idea?) for TPTB to do any outrageous funny business. They’re most likely going to just fall in line with how the voting is going…there’s no manipulating the data on some of these pairings that are being voted on, because they are just getting a TON of traffic. I’d say there are very clear frontrunners for Meryl, Amy, & Charlie – if those 3 get paired up with someone else than what the data is telling us, I will be HIGHLY suspicious.
Court, when you get time to update your Switch-up voting post, will you tell us in very broad terms which celebs are involved in close races? Kind of like your comment above…or would that risk influencing the outcome?
Cidra, I would guess there will be a week 3 elimination announcement ( from week 2 dancing) after all parties have danced their week 3 dance. the 9 remaining pairings will be announced and switched. In week 4 the new couples dance, and the week 3 dance eliminated couple is announced. I have no clue on how votes for the merge couples will be used, if at all if the switch is for 1 week.
I can not envision a couple getting eliminated with only 1 week with new partner.
There are just so many unknowns.
John, ABC’s website says: You can vote as often as you like until voting closes at 11:59pm PT on MONDAY MAR 31. That means voting doesn’t end until long after the show is over on Monday. Not only has the voting not closed, but once you eliminate a couple based on the Week 2 results, you have to take another look at the votes with the eliminated couple out of the mix to see how that changes the results of the switchup voting. For example: If “Charlie/Emma” got the most switchup votes and BillyDee and Emma are eliminated based on Week 2 scores/viewer votes, then Emma is no longer available to be Charlie’s switchup partner.
I agree that the eliminated couple (pro) needs to be discarded. If voting ends after the show is shown on west coast then I agree no public announcement can be made. My next best guess is good morning America. I just do not see the powers to be trying to keep pairings a secret.
I bet there is a lot of twitter action if the eliminated couple happens on the show
I really wish that ANY of the pros could participate in the switch!! Mainly allow pros who are not cast this season or have already been eliminated to be the majority of the ones selected!! I would love to see some of them back and in the ballroom dancing! Even if its just for one week. Tristan with Amy or Meryl, Kym with Charlie or Drew, Chelsie with Cody, etc.
And judging by this interview for BWAT, Kym might not be a pro on the show any more! http://www.wvgazette.com/Entertainment/201403260197?page=1
John, you’re right, they could announce the switch-up pairings on GMA since they interview the eliminated couple on Tuesdays and they had the 3 Stooges on GMA to announce the guest judge gimmick. I just don’t get why they set the voting period so long and had it overrun next week’s show. Seems like a really bad bit of planning. Of course planning doesn’t seem to be TPTB’s strong suit. Maybe because it involves thinking; another skill that seems to be in short supply on Lord Conrad’s staff.
FWIW, I went to the ABC website to vote, and there wasn’t a “Vote” button or anything like that – just a button to generate a tweet. Now, that could be due to all of the ad/tracking blockers I’ve got installed, or the version of browser I’m running (Firefox and Ghostery running on Ubuntu Linux), but it looked screwy to me… 😯
Is it possible to really screw this up and do #DWTSNotVotingfor (then list all of the pros and celebs names) Yeah, probably not. But how fun with that be?
I have never seen so much frustration regarding one single topic.
John, I read somewhere that the pairings won’t be announced until week 4. My GUESS is that they will announce them at the beginning of the show and they will have been dancing together all week. But I could be wrong.
This seems to me to be one big cluster****.
So what I’m understanding is that the switch dances will happen in week 4, and according to what PH read they are announcing the results of the switch up pairing at the beginning of that show.
If this is true, then all the speculation about who gets who will almost be anti-climatic.
If they announce the new couples a week or even a few days before the actual performance show then they can really hype up the new pairings. You know they’d love to take advantage of (aka. beat a dead horse) some new pairings, such as Meryl/Derek and Amy/Mark.
I’m sure I’ll be sleepless for an entire week after the voting is done wondering if Peta got paired with Cody or Maks is with NeNe. Oh the anticipation for April 7, lol.
Susan2, I agree, it’s going to be pretty anti-climatic.
Having the couples try to hide who they are with from paps, social media etc seems dumb. The show loves to play up hype for next Mondays show on social media and to go media silent, plus have the couples promoting less throughout the week to try to keep the secrets seems silly and not possible. I think they will announce on GMA
Susan2, there’s no “seems” about it…this *is* one big cluster****!
I’m not sure why so many Derek fans want to see him paired with Meryl- anyone can make her shine. I think Derek’s talent is displayed more by someone with less ability and experience. I’d like to see someone else benefit from being taught by the best, Meryl has already experienced his instruction.
I would like to see him with Candace because she seems hard working and eager to learn and I think she would genuinely appreciate what he has to offer – plus I think it would be fun for the boys to switch partners – I love the bond between Derek and Mark!
Watching the switch up thing on twitter is quite interesting. They are campaigning really hard to keep the “fam” together, and by that I mean
Meryl and Val, Danica and Maksim. They couldn’t care less about Tony and his partner Nene, wellwe all know they really really want her with Derek.Tony is getting no love from then. And now little sister Zendaya is getting in on the hash-tags… for Maks and Val only though.
Opal, Derek fans want Meryl to be paired with Derek because before she was announced as being on the show, she said if she did DWTS, she’d like to dance with Derek. She’s been so gracious about being partnered with Maks instead, that it only seems appropriate to try to get her at least one week on DWTS with Derek.
Did MerylVal overtake MerylDerek ? I guess Zendaya still has a grudge over Derek for beating her.
Depends on how you count it, Ananya. The answer is both no and yes. 🙂
It is funny to me that the only way the Fam can win anything is if four fan groups (Maks, Val, Tony and Zendaya) band together…and yet NONE of them have a Mirror Ball. So, the moral is – they can spam, but the general audience ain’t all that impressed. LOL.
Wow…just saw that Zendaya is telling everyone to tweet for Val and Maks to just switch. Guess we know what they want to do. Seriously…shes the only celeb out there who is tweeting for this switch up. I thought I was done with the “zswaggers”…guess not.
I asked all of Derek’s past partners to RT. So far only Joanna did.
Because they not only have lives, but they know Derek won’t care.
I know. I didn’t care until I saw Zendaya’s tweet, “we need to keep it in tha fam” just really rubbed me the wrong way.
Not just four fan groups – at least as far as the NeNe/Derek votes are concerned. I think a lot of Mark’s fans are voting for that also. I think the hardcore C Bro’s, Tony and Mark fans see this whole switch thing as an opportunity to vote “against” Derek. And they can still vote for their favorites while doing it. It’s win win for them.
#Goldie – the only problem with trying to vote “against” Derek is that it just won’t work. That is, 1 – He won’t care and 2 – he can make *anybody* shine!
I’d love to see him dance with Meryl for the sheer entertainment value their dance would have. But I’d be fine with him dancing with anybody else, because he works with all his partners to make them fabulous…
#LurkerB5 I agree. I’m not saying they make sense, but I get the sense they feel they are sticking it to Derek by voting for him with NeNe. In a way, it kind of sucks for NeNe being treated like that, but the upside for her is that if she gets Derek she’ll be in fine hands.
True, Goldie, I had thought of that also. And really, it’s the only way they can “win” anything. How sad.
Lurker is right – Derek will be fine with anyone and, in spite of Mark’s fans, I’m happy she will likely go to him.
Seriously, Zendaya is such a poor loser! I’m at her age & I feel so ashamed for her, so immature!
Reading the latest comments here, it sounds like people have have already given up when it comes to pairing Meryl with Derek..??! I agree, Derek would be good with anyone, but I don’t want to see the C-brother-army ”win”! Their behaviour is so off-turning, i find Maks’ tweet how he says he only wants Meryl with his bro kinda rude to all his fellow pros, including Tony! I bet Meryl would still like to dance with Derek, but at this point she probably wouldn’t admit it because of Maks (maybe he told her not to say so..?).
Really, I actually have nothing against any of the pros, but as I said, I find the C-Brother’s behaviour so annoying! It’s #DWTSMerylDerek all the way for me (although I also like the Candace-combination).
Having mature members of the younger demo (like audrey and aviva) share their points of view gives me hope for the future.
I’m sure Maks has not told Meryl what to say or not say. He does respect her as an accomplished athlete and mature individual, and I doubt she’d take well to being told to keep quiet. Of course, Meryl probably would like to have at least a week with Derek, but she’s too gracious (and sensible) to say so at this point. She’s also smart and pragmmatic enough to realize that Derek’s non-DWTS commitments conflict with her need to travel for Stars on Ice. So Maks is the better choice of partner for her since it’s no problem for him to go on the road with her.
I see on this Saturday morning the C Bros are in obnoxious vomit inducing mode. I guess Tony isn’t family as long as he is dancing with Nene. This is becoming like a bad gym class. Nene is the one nobody wants on their team. I hope all of their BS backfires.
It’s not a “win” when it’s achieved like this, Audrey – that’s for sure. And this is why Derek is always a winner – he never needs this sort of behavior or these sorts of tactics.
Now if NeNe gets eliminated this could be real intersting
Sherry2, I wonder if the Fam has written NeNe off – figuring she’s the one who’s going to get eliminated on Monday? She’s definitely not a contender. So they’re not going to waste their time on her.
I am beginning to think that the show needs to be renamed dancing with the pros. This switch has just emphasized how more important the pro is. It is not about Danica, NeNe, etc. has anyone noticed all the politics on the male pro side. I think it is time to get some new pros. I am unaware of politics on the female side, but that might be my ignorance
Cidra, that may very well be the case. Nene really has no fan-base, even on her show people don’t really care for her. If this is the case ( Nene eliminated) all of this “mean- spritedness” on twitter is all in vain, which is fun to watch, because a TV show shouldn’t be taken this seriously.
Is there going to be an elimination on Monday? If so, what happens to the eliminated couple’s switch votes that have already been made?
John, I agree that the rabid fan bases long-since made it about the pros rather than the celebs, and the way they are treating the celebs like cattle at an auction is disgusting. However, I think for the casual viewer, the show still is about the celebs, their partnership with their pro, and their shared journey (although I’m sure longtime viewers like some pros better than others).
The fan wars we’re seeing on Twitter are being fought by the tiny minority of hardcore fans. “Ma and Pa Onthecouch” voted as usual on Monday to save whichever couple they liked best this week or this season. Some might have gone over to the switch-up page and matched up a few celebs with a few pros, and then they went on with their lives.
So, the longer this goes on, the more I’m thinking it’s rigged. How? By introducing confusion. There have been quite a few posts on this thread, talking about whether or not spaces are in hashtags (take it from a computer geek, Miss Court knows what she’s talking about), or whether “Maksim” or “Maks” counts. Or what they do with eliminated pros. There’s enough confusion here that I don’t think it makes a tinker’s damn what we do on Twitter – Conrad’s gonna do what Conrad’s gonna do.
The rules on the web site said they are counting both the full name and the nickname, with spaces and w/out.
“To be valid, each Twitter vote must contain three consecutive parts:
The hashtag of “#DWTS”
The Star’s first name
The Pro’s first name. The Pro of the opposite gender who has not been eliminated yet. That Pro must also not be that celebrity’s original partner.”
“In calculating votes, we’ll consider any tweets that contain the three parts listed above (they must be adjacent without other words in between, though spaces are fine). Your tweet can be all about the sandwich you just ate so long as it still has the three required elements in consecutive order (as listed above). And since some Stars and Pros have nicknames, we’ll try to anticipate potential variations you might use in your tweets so we can be sure to count those votes, too.”
http://abc.go.com/shows/dancing-with-the-stars/vote-faq (section 7)
LOL Sally – I just wrote to Court and Vogue saying “Of course it’s rigged.” Thing is, there is a rather extensive discussion on ABC.com of how to vote and how the votes will be counted, but in reading it, I was not satisfied. It’s still vague enough and includes words like “we’ll try” and it mentions that “spaces are fine” but it never comes right out and says that they will count both. It also says if someone has a “nickname” we’ll try to determine all the combinations and count them all. “We’ll try”. Uh huh.
Dork that I am, I determined all the ways to count the votes, who has what votes and who is dancing with who (as of this morning). 🙂
Ah, Jara, you missed all the weasel words. “We’ll consider” and “spaces are fine” and “we’ll try to anticipate”. You see, you have a lot more faith in the producers than I do – I see all those words and I see all kinds of ways for them to get around it to whatever they want to happen.
It will be interesting to see what they come up with, regardless. 🙂 Particularly if you’re really secure in your favorite. Oh…wait…. 🙂
PH, will you be posting your predictions for switch up after voting is closed?
The unfortunate thing about this whole charade is when DWTS reveals the switched up pairs, 99% of the audience will honestly believe that the partnerships were decided by the Twitter vote.
My give-a-damn’s busted on the whole Twitter voting thing. We’re going to end up with whatever pairings TPTB want to see. I just hope we can get past this switch-up, get the original partnerships back together, and move on to the next gimmick.
@Jara (#83) Well, as Miss C mentioned, there’s one hell of a big difference (programming-wise) from picking up “#DWTSMerylDerek” and “#DWTS Meryl Derek”. Mainly because you just can’t count hashtag searches; you’ve got to actually vacuum-up twitter traffic and analyze it – with the latter (spaces included), you’ve (supposedly) got to filter out “The only reason I watch #DWTS is to see Meryl dance and Derek choreograph a great routine.” The second one has the words in the right order, they’re just not adjacent. The hashtag (as we’ve seen here) can be watched any number of ways.
That, and the “we’ll try” and “we’ll consider” verbiage leaves TPTB considerable wiggle-room, IMO. And when I think “TPTB”, I think “A bunch of ass-wipe morons who’d sell their mother’s soul to the devil himself for a full ratings point in the key demographic.” It’s just easier to type “TPTB”. 🙂
Oh, one other thing – if you’re going to have to write programs to analyze a bunch of twitter traffic, there’s a big difference between “#DWTS Meryl Derek”, “#dwts meryl derek”, and #DWTS MERYL DEREK”… yes, capitalization counts 🙁 Not to mention that “DWTS Meryl Derek” is different (with more than 1 space between the words). Good programmers deal with it; bad programmers drop your votes… 😯
Courtney is going to be doing that. She’s in charge of it. I just got curious today while she was off having fun. I imagine we will talk and see if our results agree. 🙂
And the programs that we have available to monitor them do pick up the ones with the spaces – which would matter because that’s indicative of who’s voting by the web site. HOWEVER, the searches done on stuff like #DWTS Meryl Derek will pick up both the adjacent AND the non-adjacent versions, as Sally was saying. Because they’re too simple. This means that we can’t keep them that honest.
I see the rules DWTS finally decided to post 5-days into voting has come up with a unique way of tabulating votes that I never considered. Total up all the votes a star has gotten, ignoring who the match is, and pair that star with the partner they were most frequently paired with. Move to the star with the next highest TOTAL vies, rinse and repeat.
@PH … Slapping my head!! You’re right, I missed all the weasel words :0). Now, I just had an awful thought. If they’re banking on heavy tweeter voting in the hopes of a rating boost, I wouldn’t be surprised if they pull this in future seasons.
Why do I all of the sudden feel like I wasted five days of my life?
I’m a bit confused, I have been seeing chatter about a switch back vote. I thought the celeb was picking if they took their partner back or kept the new one, did they change the switch back to a viewer vote?
This has all turned into another thing to turn me off of this show. April 7 is the finals of the college basketball tournament so DWTS will be going up against that. So this switch thing and trying to keep under wraps who got who and announce that night leads me to believe they are adding suspense because of that. Although not sure how many people who watch DWTS will be into the basketball (although TBTP might think there are since they hired a sports reporter in Erin). I watch Erin on our second tv, my husband watches on the main tv. But since we do a family basketball pool, I’m going to be watching the basketball finals on the main tv with him. Not sure if I would have decided that anyway or if all of this stupid dwtich/twitter stuff has made the decision for me!!!!
All of you wonderful mods (and I do mean *Wonderful*) should take some time to pamper yourselves today. Relax and have some wine or get a massage, go shopping, out to eat, anything that makes you feel happy. Because once this switch up dances happens this board is going to go crazy.
Correction…..I did not mean to say I watch Erin on our second tv. I meant to say I watch DWTS on the second tv, my husband watches whatever the heck he watches on the main tv. I do not watch DWTS for Erin at all!!!!
Cher, they haven’t laid it out how they’re going to switch back. We’ve heard all different sorts of thing. I’m wondering if they take a look at the votes and just say “screw it” and make it a one week thing. I can’t imagine that their impressions have grown at all and that’s where the money comes in.
I don’t know if it’s true, but I read on Twitter that Amy has the least votes/tweets and that she is going to be stuck with Tony?! Are you kidding me?! Just no. No. I refuse to accept that.
I thought the most tweets are going to be about Amy/Charlie/Meryl,cuz it seems that everyone talks about these 3, so I’m kinda suprised right now. I really hope it’s not true.
I don’t care about Derek, he is going to be fine, he is Derek fucking Hough. Hell, he could probaby teach a broomstick how to dance. But Amy? I can only see her with Mark in this switch up thing.
So far, if anyone does a basic search on twitter for the #DWTS hashtag followed by a a celebrity name, you’ll see that some people are doing for example #DWTSMerylVal, some are doing #DWTSMeryl Val, and still others are doing #DWTS Meryl Val. If they wanted to make things easier, they’d explicitly state that hashtag are broken and therefore don’t count when you use spaces. Add in the fact that they can count the votes 3 or more different ways (by the most tweets overall, by percentages, by celebrity, or by the pro) and it seems quite obvious TPTB are making it confusing on purpose. And since the show’s main demographic does not passionately use Twitter, most viewers won’t suspect that what TPTB claim to be the Twitter results may not actually be the true results. In short, Conrad Green can pretty much do whatever he wants. No surprise there.
So far, when I do a search for #DWTSstar or #DWTSstarpro, the most common suggestion/tweets for each star are as follows:
#DWTSMeryl- 1)Val 2)Derek (their names alternate, so it’s super close)
#DWTSAmy- 1)Mark 2)Val (clear preference for Mark)
#DWTSDanica- 1)Maks 2)Mark
#DWTSCandace- 1)Derek 2)Maks 3)Tony (clear preference for Derek)
#DTWSNeNe- 1) Derek 2)Maks (pretty close)
#DWTSCharlie-1)Cheryl 2)Emma (pretty close)
#DWTSCody- 1) Sharna 2) Peta (clear preference for Sharna)
The other stars aren’t getting much twitter traffic so it’s not really worth mentioning.
Predictably, Derek and Maks are top choices for more than one star. So who gets paired with them? The stars with the most twitter votes? Or the stars with the highest percentage of twitter votes? I wonder how this casual search matches up against your tracking app data.
I don’t care for this switch at all, but I will say this about potential pairings:
Chemistry wise, I think Danica/Maks wouldn’t work because she’s pretty sensitive and Maks has a tendency to be too rough with his partners if they disappoint him. If she cried paired with Val, who is quite caring and even tempered despite his intensity, Danica would have a meltdown with Maks. (And this is not a dig at Maks. I like him quite a bit despite how many times he has made me cringe in the past because he didn’t gel well with his partners to say the least)
I just hope TPTB don’t fudge with the results to get pairings that are bound to be awkward, like NeNe/Mark (height difference is ridiculous) or Candace/Val (because Val’s all about intense passion/sexiness and Candace isn’t too keen on that.)
And please, let them get back to their original pairings in the most stress free way possible. I know diehard fans of the show focus more on the pros, but it’s really the celebrities that may suffer from the switch up because this aspect of the show is clearly not fun to them. Makes me think other celebrities would be less inclined to do the show in the future….
My opinion is Amy will be fine with who ever she gets as well. Clearly she’s currently with the very best for her, the choreographing genius but for one week, the worst that’s going to happen is that she has a very boring routine because others won’t be so good at coming up with something so interesting and memorable given her physical challenges. She’s NOT some fragile weakling who will let someone bully her into risking her long term leg function. And I honestly don’t believe any of the others would bully her anyway. I think they will be on their best behavior, any of those who might have a tendency to bully, not naming any names. Sure, she said that perhaps since Derek and Mark are so close that’s who she might be most comfortable with, but she also clearly said she’s open to whatever. That woman is NOT weak.
She does however have significant (as in HUGE) physical disadvantages in this competition. Any one else who gets to work with her is going to see it, but for now Derek is making it look easy per usual.
Now if we find out they’re doing an elimination that week or they make it very difficult to put things back the way they started I will be as wrong as wrong can be, she will definitely be harmed in her ability to progress far into the competition if she doesn’t go back to Derek.
[…] get who they get!” to the rest of the couplings. And as I mentioned in the comments of my previous update post – if you’re using the same hashtag multiple times in the same tweet, it’s likely […]