Over the five-months of this years series of American Idol 609 million votes were cast by either SMS or calling a toll-free line, beating last years figure of 578 million, according to Telescope, the company which tallies the votes. “For Wednesday’s finale, which crowned Jordin Sparks the victor, 74 million votes were logged, another top figure for the show. A previous high of 65 million votes for a finale was tallied in season three, when Fantasia Barrino won in 2004,”’ reports Variety. The Mobile Entertainment Forum recently launched guidelines in the US covering this activity, and described the US market as “nascent”—compared with the UK market which it estimated bought in $300 million last year.