Eurovision 2017

Total mess. Also over-ran massively. Was meant to be off air by 2330 but ran on until 0005 for no obvious reason.

That to me is the wrong outcome, I guess as a result of producers not having prepared for the situation. In pretty much all 50/50 voting formats a tie is usually broken by the public vote and Mirela won that while he was only 3rd.

If you've ever noticed 'Contingency Producer' on the end of UK TV show credits... This is why they exist... (They do a lot more - but it's their job to think through all eventualities that could impact a live TV show - from tied results, to phone system failure, to the studio being evacuated half way through a show etc.)

They should have known of the possibility of a tied vote, and they did. Back in 2014 it was between Brequette and Ruth Lorenzo and they both got the same score from the combined jury and phone vote, ultimately Ruth won for gaining more votes from the televote

I wonder what the Strictly Come Dancing Contingency Producer was doing that famous episode in 2008...! 😉

Three months to the day from the Eurovision Song Contest final key organising personnel have resigned en masse.

http://www.eurovision.tv/page/news?id=staffing_update_from_kyiv

In other news the first wave of tickets go on sale to the general public tomorrow, however for the first time in many years (at least 20 years) the organisers are not making any ticket packages available to OGAE members.

In summary it is all a total shambles!

Looks like I'm out of luck this year after being surprisingly lucky last time - logging on to the ticket website gave me a position of 4000(!) in the queue, and 40 minutes later I've still yet to go below 2000 - even though all the available tickets have almost certainly been sold by now.

Still, my estimated wait time is another 32 minutes...

EDIT: Ridiculously I actually ended up getting a ticket - but only after giving up entirely and randomly checking the website a few minutes ago at 2:15am! No queue at all and straight to payment - now I have to work out how the hell to get to Kiev!

BA have direct flights to Kiev from Heathrow I believe.

ISTR that in 2005, when they last hosted the ESC, they had to add temporary baggage screening facilities at Kiev airport to cope with demand, and flights were booked so quickly people had to stay on either side of their planned stay in order to get flights.

This has been an absolute mess. The contest will not get cancelled, people will demand it takes place. But they should have moved the host country by now.

I hope they have a back-up option, and hope it's not Russia either......

Harrogate...?

Er, no? Though the back up option should be SBS, the Aussie broadcaster who finished 2nd last year, who would be likely to choose the UK to host. We would be prepared more than most countries, I think.

Pointless speculation. The contest will go ahead in Kyiv, the EBU would lose too much face if Ukraine could not host. We just need to expect a smaller scale, less expensive production.