Dial Idol
An interesting piece of phone-related software for reality show addicts: Dial Idol uses your phone modem to vote (and vote and vote) for your favorite contestants on American Idol and other shows that let viewers call in their votes.
What's particularly interesting is that Dial Idol measures the amount of busy signals to determine which contestants are getting the most votes, and weighs your voting towards your favorite contestants who are getting fewer votes, so that they don't get voted off. Even more interesting, the Dial Idol web site uses aggregate data from all voters' busy signals to estimate who's going to win. The authors claim that its accuracy rate is 87%, and that the software has accurately predicted the winner of every show it has covered.
Besides American Idol, Dial Idol can call in votes for Dancing with the Stars, So You Think You Can Dance, Canadian Idol, and Celebrity Duets. Dial Idol is free, available for Windows only.