The extra nominations don't bother me at all. If they win, then they deserved to be there. If they don't, it's not as if it hurts the winners much. It somewhat cheapens the idea of being nominated without winning, whatever that's worth, but anyone who pays attention to such things can devalue those claims accordingly, anyway.
It would have taken a miracle for some of those 10 entries to have walked away with best picture. On the other hand,
The Social Network earlier was thought to have a lock on the best picture Oscar until
The King's Speech showed up on screens and started taking awards. The remake of a classic western that originally starred John Wayne pretty well ruled out both Best Picture and Best Actor awards for that film since the original is still within living memory. It was kinda lame to put
Toy Story 3 up for best picture when it was a shoo-in for best animated feature (it's correct category).
Inception was popular with young males but couldn't hope to attract the majority of academy votes with so many members outside that specific target group.
Black Swan and
The Kids Are OK (or All Right or whatever the title) were not going to appeal to a broad enough audience to take best picture. I hear The Fighter was good, but I don't think it had the same power as the two top nominees. Plus all of the talk about that film centered on Best Supporting Actor and likely Best Supporting Actress. As for the guy falling down a hole and having to cut his arm off, I don't think that would ever be the best picture of any year. And I can't even remember offhand the 10th title, but tell the truth--did you ever hear any serious talk all this year of any movie other than
Social Network or
King's Speech taking Best Picture?
Everything I read in the final days before the awards had King's Speech walking away with both best picture and best actor, so there couldn't have been much suspense as to whether any of the other 9 would win.
It's hard enough nowadays to find 5 real contenders for best picture of the year, much less pulling 5 more names out of a hat for mercy nominations.