A black and pewter pseudo-blog adorned with self-aware advertisements and caricatures, VoteForTheWorst.com has been dutifully and thanklessly disturbing the melismatic peace on pop-culture juggernaut "American Idol" for four years now.
With David Della Terza at the helm -- a longtime Idol devotee shortlisted by CNN Money as one of last year's Top 24 rabble-rousing innovators -- VFTW has over the years matched the hugely popular and profitable karaoke competition step for step by spotlighting its skulduggery, damning its pervasive commercialism and, most essentially, undermining its ambitions for crooners with actual talent. With a potent and far-reaching fan base of fun-loving, disenchanted viewers, the controversial website has now accomplished the unthinkable " a sweet, satisfying existence as the most disruptive cog in the platinum-armored machine that is American Idol.
"I think a wide variety of people enjoy VFTW," Della Terza, 25, said in an interview with The Dartmouth. Struck by Idol's "ridiculously" formulaic proceedings during season two, Della Terza was inspired to try to liven things up.
"There are people like myself who just like making fun of how awful the show is, but we still like watching it," he said. "There are people who are forced to watch the show, so they use our site to help them not want to smash their heads into brick walls. And there are people who want to see Idol go off the air. Anyone who can see beyond the glitz to what Idol really is can enjoy our website."
Boasting more than 10 million hits per week, VFTW has long surpassed its status as a mere thorn in the giant's side. Due to the frenzying success of last year's inimitable Sanjaya Malakar -- an awkward black sheep who morphed into a momentary frontrunner thanks to the website's world-famous pull -- Della Terza has mixed it up with the likes of David Letterman on the Late Show and done gigs on radio shows for Howard Stern and on video blogs for other popular Idol-related sites.
He's even been able to revel in the on-camera discomfort of Idol higher-ups being forced to rebut his well-researched and oft-cited exposs on the show's dubious dealings.
"My favorite thing this year was when an MTV reporter asked Idol executive producers what they thought about my 'plant' article," Della Terza said, referencing a recent blog in which he details season seven's blatantly uneven playing field, which is overrun with semi-pro contestants with backgrounds -- some admitted, some hidden -- in the music industry. "To me, it's hysterical that the producers have to answer to something I wrote."
And make no mistake -- the suits who run Idol have plenty of reason to loosen their ties for a breather. Not only did Sanjaya's remarkable run prove that the tongue-in-cheek website has much more influence than anyone had imagined, but many former Idol alumni (many of them working diligently on solo careers) are eager to speak to Della Terza about Idol behind-the-scenes -- as well as to lend their likeness, often VFTW-outfitted, to the front page.
"Most [ex-contestants] find us and then say they'd love to help the site," Della Terza said. "I think it's great because it shows they can laugh about all of this. The two people I've grown to like the most since their time on the show are Brenna Gethers from season five, who is an incredibly talented and amazing person, and Chris Sligh from season six, who is just remarkably driven and intelligent."
But the celebrity of his scandalous creation has not gone to his head. Della Terza, insisting that he is not much different from any other twenty-something, says he likes to keep to himself.
"I'm pretty shy and don't like doing a lot of interviews," he said. And he emphatically credits the help of others in maintaining his heavily trafficked corner of counter-Idol cyberspace, a job that's both expensive and exhausting.
"[It's] a lot of work. I have a very dedicated group of people without whom none of this would be possible," he said. Meticulous critiques sporting the site's well-known scathing wit often appear on the blog within minutes of a live show's conclusion. "Most of my friends don't even care that much about the site, which is awesome, because it keeps me grounded and gives me a good distraction when it becomes a lot of work."
As for season seven, which finally got into the nitty-gritty last week with the Top 24 rocking and/or rolling to gems from the '60s, Della Terza holds out hope that one Danny Noriega, an "endlessly entertaining" and quirky Asian-American, could be this year's Sanjaya -- the next polarizing tour de force, unshrinking from the limelight. Though the rigors of American Idol have historically proved unrewarding for the show's gay contestants, Della Terza would love for Danny's flamboyant energy to get Middle America buzzing.
"Yes, our new Sanjaya might not receive enough votes and might be voted out. But now all of the contestants know about VFTW, and the producers can never stop another Sanjaya from happening," Della Terza said.
For public enemy number one of the world's most popular singing contest, it's all about escapism: "Either you enjoy pretending that you're finding the next big superstar on a television show, or you enjoy making fun of people for caring so much about it," he said, "they're both ways to take life a little less seriously, and we all need that every now and again."
