I’d never heard of it before, but apparently Corus Entertainment runs a songwriting competition every year called Canadian Radio Star. It awards $10,000 in cash and a bunch of smaller prizes to one Canadian act.

And based on the Photoshopped clip art on the site’s homepage, you apparently also win Finger Eleven. (Is that just a one-night thing or can you, like, sell them into slavery?)

I’ve never been one for contests of creativity. They always seem more about a big company getting a cheap source of new ideas than they are about encouraging independent talent.

Here’s the skinny from the contest’s rules:

• Submit a song that you record yourself and that hasn’t been published anywhere (in other words, write a song for the competition for free)
• That song can be used by any Corus station as much as they want without paying you a cent. (Though you might get some money through SOCAN)

I know some artists are so desperate to get signed they’ll do just about anything, but it just doesn’t seem fair to me to work for free hoping that some stations will play a song you won’t get paid for. Especially when the grand prize is only $10,000. Surely a song good enough to win a national songwriting competition is worth more than a measly $10,000.

Am I just being cynical? Maybe. Maybe it’s just that horrible clip art graphic that’s getting to me.