The Voice UK

The battle rounds were supposed to be the weakest aspect of the series but I found them pretty entertaining and actually I'd be interested in seeing the current live show format scrapped and replaced by live duet battles every week. If they were drawn at random rather than matched by style that could be more interesting (or a car crash!). Lines would be open during each battle and the result would be announced after the judges give their comments meaning that there would be no endless recaps, filler or disastrously low-rating results show.

And on the subject of the lines being open during the performances I'd also quite like to see them display the percentage each artist has on screen alongside the numbers as well as a clock counting down to when the lines close. I think that would give viewers a bit more of an incentive to ring up as you'd actually be able to see the difference you'd be making to the percentage. They did this during Germany's national final for Eurovision this year and it was really exciting during the final as the voting was pretty much 50/50 throughout and tiny percentage changes would see the leader change in a second. The on-screen graphics weren't as intrusive as you would imagine either.

Also another change that they simply must execute next year is getting rid of the duos and only having solo singers. What is the point in them? Why did they have them in the first place? That's one aspect of the show I haven't been able to work out this year.

I struggle to see why duos are allowed and bands aren't.

I love the voting idea above, something akin to TOTP's Sunday show years back. It could be done through social networks instead of SMS/Phoning due to the time taken to count them, I'd imagine social networking votes would be a lot easier to monitor.

That would be unfair to the amount of people who don't use social networking though, and although I appreciate that it is growing, even for a show like this which has a young demographic, I guess they would get complaints for alienating certain types of viewer.

Good suggestions otherwise - I'm enjoying reading what other people think should happen next year.

If Germany can do it by phone surely we can?! Perhaps if they took the phone numbers off-screen with 10 seconds or so to go and told viewers to stop phoning at that point the final votes could be added on in those 10 seconds.

Perhaps after all the phone controversy in recent years this is something that sadly wouldn't be able to happen in UK any more.

Applicants for contestants or the judges?

Skipped through the show this morning and I think the best bit compilations highlighted everything which is wrong about the show - they were all about the judges and their journey, with the finalists experience not even mentioned. And then the last performance of the series was the judges plugging their greatest hits rather than the winner plugging their single.

Surely people would then realise how little their vote affects the outcome. Even worse, there will be cases of people voting for A and the on screen graphic showing the percentage for B going up. Maybe I am generalising a bit but the people who vote in these types of programmes probably didn't go to school and are unlikely to understand how percentages work. They are going to end up thinking that something has gone wrong, or worse, that the result is fixed. Digital Spy would be full of posts from people who spent all their job seekers allowance on phone votes and think they have been ripped off.

It is just easier for the BBC not to bother. They, quite rightly, aren't allowed to make profit from the phone votes anyway, so they would only be benefiting the phone companies by increasing the number of votes. If anything, the BBC should be educating people on the pointlessness of voting in reality shows, not encouraging it.

Thanks for that. That was very useful.

That's what people said about Fame Academy. It came back the following year and made barely a ripple as everyone had already made up their mind.

Very true.
Some will still watch the second series and it will probably be evangelised if it's any good.

Do you really believe that millions of telephone voters in the UK didn't go to school, or are you just doing your provocative bit?

I think the point is "viewer engagement", and voting is a straightforward way of getting the audience invested in the programme, whether its for the immediacy of an instant result or to keep them coming back for a results show.

But I tend to agree that it ends up being a tax on stupidity, and a lazy way to compel your audience.

But Simon Cowell's made a decent living out of it, so that's alright then.

There's absolutely no point in any phone voting if the judges get to have the final say on who gets the chop anyway.

I think what needs to change more urgently is how flat the formal feels. We know X Factor is pre-recorded, but the audition shows make a point of that. "The judges have flown to Glasgow", "look at all the people outside", "here's a montage of some of the losers we saw".

The Voice audition shows were done pretty much "as live" and because it obviously wasn't live, it felt dull. Same with the results show. That has to all change next year.

Also, the show needs to be shorter. Expecting people to sit through more than an hour of spinning chairs is far too much. X Factor only sustains as long as it does because of the ad breaks which give you a chance to breathe.

That does rather make you sound like a shill.