Eurovision 2015 - 60th Anniversary Edition

Yes, I think the second placed country would be the fairest option. I hope if Australia win we don't end up with another SVT production through default. As brilliant as they are it would be good to see a variety in the productions again. Though this year has shown so far that you can have a generic style for the shows yet the host broadcasters can still manage to f*ck it up!

The reason why Molly lost was because of lack of personal connection between her and the audience, as explained in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNY0oU2pZ7U

Italy would do well, but their disadvantage is coming last due to the televoting. If it's 15 mins, they may just choose a song which remained good in their head for a long time. They'll do well jury-wise though.

The BBC would be the logical choice due to the Commonwealth connections.

Very interesting, thanks for the share. Sorry if this is a dumb question - how much influence do the entries themselves have when it comes to the TV direction? Obviously the staging is planned out by the delegates, but do they also contribute to the shooting script? i.e. do we have the director on the evening to blame for these problems with the direction, or is the the fault of the British entry?

Eurovision Song Contest 2015 Analysis
Here are all the 27 finalists, in alphabetical order (not order of performance):
Albania, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom.

Now for the 13 countries who failed to reach the final, but which will still vote tomorrow night:
OUT: Belarus, Czech Republic, Denmark, F.Y.R. Macedonia, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Malta, Moldova, Portugal, San Marino, Switzerland, The Netherlands.

Now for some country groups:

Baltic States (Ex USSR)
IN: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.

Benelux
IN: Belgium. OUT: The Netherlands. (Luxembourg didn't enter yet again).

Nordic area
IN: Norway, Sweden. OUT: Denmark, Finland, Iceland.

Greece and Cyprus
IN: Cyprus, Greece.

Former Yugoslavia
IN: Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia. OUT: F.Y.R. Macedonia. (Bosnia & Herzegovina and Croatia didn't enter in 2015).

Founding Seven
By this I mean the seven countries which appeared in the very first Eurovision Song Contest in Lugano in 1956:
IN: Belgium, France, Germany, Italy. OUT: Switzerland, The Netherlands. (Luxembourg didn't enter yet again).

Obviously who qualified and who didn't will affect voting patterns within these groups. Of course it's almost certain Greece and Cyprus will give each other 12 points.

More about this here

Each delegation contains a few members called a creative team, so they would assist the producers in what the performance looks like on TV.

Though to be fair it would be irresponsible of SBS and the EBU to let Australia compete without some idea of where it would end up next year.

Belgium is my pick from the semi-finals but nobody is talking about it and I'm usually the kiss of death with any prediction. On paper it seems a bit too early in the running order but how much of a factor is that. When is the last time a song from the first half won and is it possible it's all just a coincidence that in recent years the better songs have been later?

Conchita, the winning entry from last year performed in the first half.

Vienna's suffering from coming off the back of two amazingly produced contests: Malmo had the best host in recent times, if not ever, in Petra Mede (doing it all on her own by the way) and Copenhagen's staging was the best I've seen. I'm hoping they're holding back some WOW factor for the main event as even the kinetic lights seem to be underused at the moment and always on white, and some plastic on the floor from the green room to the stage "a bridge of light" does not make.

I'm guessing that the whole thing takes out a venue for a least a month so if it ever was to come back to London I'm thinking Excel?

Costs a fortune to host however does anyone know how far the ticket prices for the rehearsal shows, jury final, semi finals and main show go to offsetting the total cost?

Not sure of the figures exactly, but Eurovision has plenty of sponsors who probably form a bulk of the contributions, we just never see any mention of the sponsors on the BBC (Microsoft is the main sponsor this year).

Also here's the scoreboard this year: a nice change from the last couple of years design, but I'm not a massive fan of having the total points on the left side.

http://fs2.directupload.net/images/150522/k59xqa5w.jpg

Also for the first time the map actually has to extend across the globe!

http://fs1.directupload.net/images/150522/fy8onh64.jpg

Just watched the UK rehearsal from today. Sounding and looking good sugar 😜

Good enough to get more than Nil points?