"American Idol" ran nearly nine minutes long Tuesday, preventing potentially millions of viewers who rely on their DVRs from seeing the performance of Adam Lambert -- which, in turn, affected the number of viewer votes Lambert received.
Luckily for Fox, Lambert, one of this season's most popular Idolettes, was not given the old heave-ho the next night; it was Scott MacIntyre instead who had received the fewest votes from viewers Tuesday night and was removed from the competition at the end of last night's results-and-product-plugging show.
Neither host Ryan Seacrest nor any of the "Idol" judges in any way acknowledged the show's potentially serious blunder. However, when the results show finally got down to it, Lambert was the very first Idolette Seacrest dealt with, and the host noted that the previous night Simon Cowell had had to speak for all the judges (because, of course, there had been no time for the other judges to critique Lambert's performance).
But Seacrest didn't ask Lambert how he felt about being handled differently from all the other competitors during Tuesday's show. Rather, he was asked how he felt about having received a standing ovation from Cowell.
