Fox announced that this week’s American Idol will be pre-taped because there is a “new director and new judges, and it has nothing to do with manipulation.” Though I agree that this has nothing to do with manipulation, I’m certain it has everything to do with incompetence. It takes a lot of skill to produce a live show, and pre-taping it is a cop-out way of saying they can’t execute the task. Furthermore, the essence of American Idol’s brand is that it’s a live show, so this is preposterous. I’d like to also add that I feel terrible for the audience this week, because if you ever gone to a non-live show taping, then you know it’s absolute torture to sit through five hours of taping for a one hour show. To put things in perspective, they often don’t even let you leave to pee. Yeah — you heard me.