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BY JEFFREY BENTO-CARRIER

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Another Emmy Awards ceremony has come and gone, and television fans are again scratching their heads in relation to the academy's picks for which actors, and shows, were the best on the 2007-08 small-screen season.

The 2008 Emmys, held on Sunday, gave another chance for the industry to reflect on one more year of success, but fans were left wondering if the voters (still) have any sense of what talent is and what favouritism is.

A prime example was the Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy prize.

My favourite actor on the small-screen over the past decade, Neil Patrick Harris, was nominated for a third straight time in this category for playing Barney, the metrosexual-with-a-heart-of-gold on CBS's beloved hit How I Met Your Mother.

Harris' portrayal of Barney has drawn accolades throughout the industry and has helped CBS re-build its Monday night lineup from scratch.

For this work-of-gold, did he win the trophy on Sunday? Of course he didn't!

His category ended up another repeat victory for the less-than-stellar Jeremy Piven, who picked up his prize for a show (Entourage) which has a niche market with the Emmy voters, but only a dollop of the water cooler impact HIMYM has.

What makes Piven's win in 2008, and in previous years, so mind-numbing is his victories are a prime example of who likes you, in combination with how you are placed in the Hollywood pecking order, eventually determines if you win the big prize or not.

Some critics, including this scribe, have pointed out in previous years his work is as solid as the rest of the cast of his show, but he gets a bit more critical acclaim because of his mother, a well-loved Hollywood grand dame from many years back, who tends to sway more of the veteran voters to his side.

If Neil Patrick Harris was robbed, which I think he was, maybe it's time for the academy to get more critics in the mix to determine if the best actor, or the best show, is truly tops.

Everything in life, in one way or another, comes down to who likes you and who doesn't.

Some jobs, and the accolades associated with them, are decided by who you know, not how good you are.

The same real-life discrimination impacts the Emmys.

If Neil Patrick Harris was the son of a major former Hollywood star, he might have won on Sunday night, but at least his victory would have had more to do with what he was doing on the screen than what producer his parents knew back in the 1960s.

In today's 1,000 channel television universe, it's sometimes hard to gauge what can rise to the top, or gets left on the sidelines.

All I know is that if Harris would have won on Sunday, it would have been — wait for it — leg-en-dary.

Piven's victory was not legendary. It was a cliché from the moment his name was called to the end of his acceptance speech.

Maybe next year the Emmys could have a category which would allow the five nominated actors to re-create their best scenes live and the audience could vote, right there at the awards, on who was the best.

Now that would be legendary!