Category: Site News

Yes it’s that time where I spend just a couple of minutes to talk about this series for The Strictly Spoiler and thank a few people who have helped contribute to another massive year.

And massive is really the word. 2021 has blown away so many records for this site and the record book has been pretty much thrown out. Peaking at 1.3 Million views in a weekend throughout the series the spoiler has at the time of writing been viewed here almost 10 million times by 2.3 million of you. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think I’d be recording weekend views in the magnitude of millions but here we are. It doesn’t feel like too long ago I was getting excited about a few thousand views and now we are talking about millions. It’s mad, bewildering and a little scary especially as the site has been struggling with the numbers a couple of times this series even with my scalable hosting solution and because of this my costs have sky rocketed as I’ve had to deploy increasing numbers of very powerful servers to cope with the demand.

Hosting this website will have cost me over £2k throughout the 13 weeks of this series once I get my December hosting bill and that’s without factoring other expenses that I incur into the equation. This is a ludicrous sum of money to be paying and is one reason why the website pushes a number of monetisation options to help support these large costs as there is no way I would be able to afford to keep this site running if I were to run it as a hobby as I did at the start.

Many of you have used the donation options available and I am really grateful to each and every one of you. Whilst the donations received haven’t covered the costs in full this series and that’s to be expected given how much they have spiralled from previous series they have seriously lightened the load and I’m grateful to each and every one of you who has donated whether you’ve donated £1 or £50. If you want to get a last minute donation in, buy me a pint or an early Christmas present to thank me for all the spoilers you can do so using THIS LINK (make sure to click send and not request) or the button below. Please only do so if you can afford to do so and there is zero obligation on anyone to help me out in this way.

Another way you guys have been helping me out with my costs is through the Patreon page. This was launched in 2020 but due to the pandemic I wasn’t able to push it as much as I would have liked and was only offering a warm fuzzy feeling to those few who signed up in 2020. Things were very different in 2021 and there are now over 100 of you on Patreon. For just the price of a coffee every month Patreon supporters have received the spoiler advert and monetisation free but have also received the results of the exit poll. Taken just after The BBC vote closes this poll has accurately predicted those in danger of landing in the dance off each week though has been a little less reliable at picking the precise bottom two, though this was also the case last series when the poll was being used as a spoiler back up due to the pandemic.

I’m grateful to everyone who has signed up to patreon as you too have helped me towards the spiralling costs and I hope a good few of you stick around during the off season as even though Strictly isn’t on I do still incur costs all year round. You can sign up to Patreon here and I’ll be in touch with everyone on Patreon in the new year to try and get ideas on what you’d like to see there in 2022.

Moving on and I’d like to thank my sources. I work closely with a few other spoiler sources and in a normal series we’d all source moles and help each other out with the spoiler. This was not a normal series but thankfully I have another source who has once again been invaluable at providing the spoiler even on the weeks when there has been no mole due to the audience capacity. Without this source things would have been a lot quieter on the spoiler front this year (and last). Last series I offered to send this person a little gift at Christmas however they declined but instead asked that I make a charity donation on their behalf. I’ll be making the same offer in due course to thank this person.

Finally I just want to thank each and every one of you who comes to the website and views the content I put out each week. It still flabbergasts me how many of you do that and I’m grateful to each and every one of you!

All that remains is to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

In what’s been a bit of an annual tradition and after a multitude of new issues I’ve had to fix which have taken me the best part of a day the migration from the cheaper off season hosting to the hosting solution I use to keep the site up when it is under load has been completed.

If any of you notice any major issues as you browse the site please let me know on the social networks. I’m especially interested in any issues in viewing single posts or interacting with the site such as voting in the poll that’s currently running. There’s been a host of teething issues as the site is now using a different platform for the web server which threw up a ton of incompatibilities but I think I’ve sorted them all.

This setup is not cheap and last year hosting was costing me well over £500 a month. You can help me out with these costs by making a one time donation using THIS LINK or the button below. Please only do so if you can afford to do so and there is no obligation on anyone to help me out this way.

Or join the crew on Patreon. For less than the price of a coffee a month you gain access to the spoiler in an ad free form and also will gain access to the results of the exit poll providing the earliest indication as to how the dance off has gone each week minutes after The BBC vote closes and hours before the spoiler or any other spoiler source.

Or you can support me and earn yourselves £50 in the bargain by checking your energy prices and switching to Octopus Energy. Octopus have cheap green renewable energy, are a Which recommended supplier and are routinely cheaper than the energy price cap that many suppliers set their prices based on. The energy market is in turmoil at the moment with prices sky rocketing and the energy price cap due to rise by about £150 so this is a really good time to check you are on the best deal and lock in the best deal you can before the winter.

After a year absence due to Covid the regular weekly competition is back, bigger and better than ever. And this series really is the biggest as one of you will be winning a huge £500 Amazon UK voucher!

To get involved all you have to do is join the discussion over on Facebook or Twitter each week. One person every week on each network will win a voucher worth up to £100. But this year there is a twist!

Winners can choose to keep their prize. Or they can hand it back for a chance to win the big prize at the end of the series. The choice will be entirely yours……

Boring Legal Bit

1. This competition is open to all UK and Republic of Ireland residents barring any close family members or friends of the promoter.
2. The competition will run from 25/09/21 to 18/12/21 inclusive. These dates are provisional and may change depending when the 2021 series of Strictly airs
3. Each promotional period will run from Midnight Saturday until the following Midnight Saturday with the exception of the final week which will run on the day of the final only.
4. Each social network has their own pool of prizes which initially comprise of 4*£10 Amazon UK vouchers, 4*£20 vouchers, 2*£35 vouchers, 1*£50 voucher and 1*£100 voucher. Prizes will be randomly allocated a week by means of random number generator and different value prizes will be available to be won each week and on different social networks. Participants can keep track of the available prizes using the matrix below. The promoter also reserves the right to offer spot prizes at his discretion on the social networks and these will be subject to the same terms including the chance to reject the prize for a grand prize draw entry. Alternatively spot prizes may award direct entry into the grand prize draw without offering an initial prize.
5. Entrants will be required to comment on the respective social networking profiles in order to enter including the tagging of the profile where required and the use of any hashtags detailed on the social networking profiles.
6. Entrants will be required to be liking or following the respective social networking profiles in order to be eligible to win a prize
7. Each week one entry will be selected as a winner on each social network, contacted on that social network and offered the randomly allocated prize for that week or the chance to enter the prize draw at the end of the series for a chance to win a £500 voucher
8. In the event the promoter believes that an entry is not eligible for reasons of their location, they aren’t following or liking the profiles or for any other reason a redraw will take place
9. Should a winner decide to enter the grand prize draw their original prize will become forfeit
10. Each winner will have 7 days from the point that they are contacted to communicate their decision to the promoter. Should they fail to contact the promoter or provide any details requested to allow prize fulfilment in this time the prize will be forfeit and will not be offered to another participant
11. The first decision received by the promoter as to whether a winner wishes to take the prize or enter the final draw will be considered the final decision and no change of mind will be permitted
12. During the weekend of the final a winner will be selected at random out of all comments received during the final day on each social network. These winners will not be offered a prize but will earn a place in the grand prize draw
13. The winner of the grand prize of a £500 Amazon UK voucher will be selected at random out of everyone who chose to reject their original prize for a chance to enter the draw and the final two winners from the day of the final and will be selected as soon after the final as possible. The exact format of the grand prize draw will be confirmed separately to entrants in the draw
14. Prizes will be paid out in batches. Any prizes won during September or October will be paid by the end of November. Any. prizes won during November will be paid by the end of December. Any prizes won during December including the Grand Prize will be paid by the end of January 2022. These are the latest dates in which prizes will be paid out and prizes may be paid earlier at the promoters discretion
15. The promoter reserves the right to amend these terms and conditions should he be required to for any reasons out of his control or withdraw the competition for the same reasons. This includes but is not limited to reasons relating to the Covid-19 pandemic, the withdrawal or suspension of the social networking profiles or alterations to the format or length of the 2021 series of Strictly by The BBC.
16. Should the promoter be required to invoke clause 15 above and is unable to offer the grand prize any participant affected by the changes who previously rejected a prize will have their earlier prize reinstated and paid out using details previously supplied
17. Should the promoter be required to invoke clause 15 above and alter the length of the competition, prizes will be removed at random from the prize pools to accommodate this
18. Any personal data provided by a winner will be processed in accordance with your rights under GDPR and only used for the purposes of prize fulfilment and only shared with Amazon UK for the same purpose.
19. The promoters decision in all aspects of this competition is final and no correspondence will be entered into
20. This competition is promoted by Dave Thorp t/a The Strictly Spoiler (https://www.strictlyspoiler.com)

Prizes still to be won (correct as of Week 12)

Prize	Twitter	Facebook
£10 Voucher	0	0
£20 Voucher	1	0
£35 Voucher	0	1
£50 Voucher	0	0
£100 Voucher	0	0
£500 Grand Draw Entry (final week only)	1	1

Number of people in the Grand Prize Draw – 10 (correct as of Week 12)