With the help of Twitter and YouTube, the Brit Awards are going global.
For the first time, the awards ceremony will include a social media vote as viewers are invited to tweet their vote for the Best Video award.
Tony Wadsworth, CBE, chairman BPI and Brit Awards Ltd, said: "British music excels on the world stage, so it’s a logical step for our biggest awards event to go global."
However, my quandary with this is – will anyone outside of the UK actually be interested in voting? Time difference would have a big hindrance here. The US would be between five and eight hours behind, so would be in the middle of their day – I doubt it would occur to many people to log in to Twitter to vote while they are buried under paperwork at their desk.
Meanwhile on the other side of the world, the Australians will be tucked up in bed while the show is being broadcast in the UK, so it is unlikely they will be picking up their smartphones to get involved either.
Additionally, the web is helping out with the nominations for the Best Video award as well as just the winner.
The nominees for the award will be based on YouTube views, so if you want to keep your favourite artist in the running, just keep that video on repeat until 10 February when the nominations will be announced.