Idol Gives Back a ratings downer

I'll guess that, since American Idol scheduled a separate show for last night to throw out the latest loser, many people didn't feel the need to watch Idol Gives Back on Wednesday. This year's show had 17.8 million viewers, well below last year's 27 million. I wonder if fewer donations were made as well (it's hard to tell with the figures being thrown about since there are also corporate donations).

You may remember that, after going through the whole show saying someone was being sent home, Ryan Seacrest told Jordin Sparks that she was the lowest vote-getter, then turned around and said that no one was leaving after all. Last night Ryan announced that Michael Johns got the fewest votes and followed up with: ''Now, last year during Idol Gives Back, we didn't eliminate anybody at this stage of the competition. Tonight...we're going to say goodbye to Michael Johns." That was just cruel. However, if they went through that whole hour last night, separating it from Idol Gives Back, and then not thrown him out, I guarantee that would've been the jump-the-shark moment for Idol.