Site: YouBloom.com 
Just got an invitation to enter new song contest website called YouBloom.com, based in Europe. Here’s their own blurb:
“Artists… enter your songs now to compete in our exciting Song Contest with heats, playoffs and the Grand Final. Song entry and voting is FREE and there’s €28,000 worth of cash prizes to be won by contestants and voters. This year’s contest has 2 qualifying rounds with 8 weeks of heats, member-voting quarterfinal, professional judging semifinal and member-voting final – from which 8 winners will go forward to the YouBloom annual playoffs in November.
The professional judging panels will be headed up by Bob Geldof and international A&R legend, Nigel Grainge.”
The site is brand new, and the first contest starts May 4, 2010. The site has a very simple and basic layout. Artists just enter songs. There is no significant provision for profiles, photos, and stuff – just a single photo, short bio, and one link. You mainly just enter songs. (You can enter an album cover, but currently there is no real way to actually check out that things have uploaded properly – an oversight they will likely have to correct.)
The contest format has heats, which will run sequentially over time. You can enter one song per heat – a different song per heat. The heat winners are to be reviewed by judges, and those picked move on to the final rounds. It seems there will be several contest per year.
So far, nothing bad. But here’s the deal – each voter (someone who has joined YouBloom) can vote for only 4 songs per heat, and the songs with the most votes move on. There is no judgment involved here – just voting. So what this contest will actually be is a measure of bands with the biggest and best organized street teams. This may reflect quality, but it mostly reflects your street team skills.
The contest hasn’t really started yet, but it seems clear from the rules that this is what will happen. Time will tell.
But since it is a brand new site, you might check it out, and perhaps enter a song or two. Doesn’t take much time.
Final judgement: We’ll see.
