The Grammy Awards have had their rulebook altered after Lady Gaga was denied a nomination in the Best New Artist category last year.
The longstanding rules prevented any act who had previously been nominated for a Grammy from being eligible for the Best New Artist award. Despite the fact that Lady Gaga was by far and away the biggest breakthrough act of 2009, she missed out on the nomination, because her hit debut single 'Just Dance' had been nominated in 2008 for Best Dance Recording.
To avoid similar situations in future, the Academy have altered their rules so that the award will still be open to acts that have been previously nominated for Grammy Awards, as long as they had not released a full album at the time. Artists will not, however, be eligible if they have previously won an award.
As reason for the change the Academy stated, "More and more, the first release of a new artist is as a featured artist on someone else’s album or, the new artist may release a single long before the release of his/her/their entire first album. By current rules, if the other artist's album or the new artist’s single receives a nomination, the new artist may never have the opportunity to compete in the Best New Artist category. With this change, each artist will have at least one opportunity to enter in this important and highly visible category."