Mercury Madness

So this year's nominees for the Mercury Music prize have been announced and we have the usual mixture of commercial and eccentric acts completing the list.

But I have two questions for the judging panel who nominated the 10 albums chosen:

Firstly, do you really think anyone actually cares about this award (or any award for that matter) anymore?

And secondly, can one of you tell me why Portishead's "Third" and M.I.A's "Kala" were omitted from the list? Crazy, just totally crazy!