After that story and the background into the turkey's loyal following over there, I'm glad I don't live in Ireland.
Have to say I'm favouring the Rob McVeigh song. It may be completely bland and a typical ballad, but at least it sounds like the guy can sing, which is more than I can say for the other ragtag of Europop, Girls Aloud and 70s disco wannabes.
Oh my god! The worst thing is that's probably Ireland's best chance for a decade - surely RTE have saved up enough now so they can afford to host it annually once again.
UK wise the problem is the options the viewers are given - faded stars, crap songs.
It needs opening back up with twice as many options for the public to choose from. The regional voting should also be scrapped (it might have been last year actually) and it simply be the one with the most votes wins, but they could still reveal the results region by region - they just need to ensure the bigger regions results are nearer the end.
Eurovision wise and the one semi-final was bad enough, never mind too. I think just the one is fine, but IMO it would be better as like a B-final where the prize for the top 10 or so is a slot in the main show for their country the next year, with the bottom 10 from the main show relegated to next years B-final.
Voting wise though it needs to go back to just the countries competing being able to vote, though I think the votes of none competing countries should be combined to form one more round of voting.
Just for info - for those of you who haven't seen Melodifestivalen, the Swedish version of "Eurovision : Your Decision" - this is a clip from last night's show.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkur2FPAxPI
It might not last long as SVT pull their content from YouTube quite quickly.
This is one of the two songs from last night's show that went to the final. (They have 4 shows featuring 8 songs each, two go through to the final from each show, two go through to a "Second Chance" show from each show which selects 2 more for the final, meaning the final has 10 songs - and is often the most watched show on Swedish TV...)
Oh - and each week the show comes from a different place in Sweden - so they move the stage and OB trucks every week. (They're going to a city inside the Arctic circle for the Second Chance show...)
Whether you like the song or not (I do) - the coverage and the sheer confidence and exuberance make for great telly.
It needs opening back up with twice as many options for the public to choose from.
The real problem is that no record labels will get involved in the UK any more - so only unsigned (i.e. unknown or has-been) acts are ever an option at the moment. In other countries the labels get right behind the contest as it generates huge record sales domestically. (In Sweden the entries to their selection show usually fill the top 10 and often the top 20)
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The regional voting should also be scrapped (it might have been last year actually) and it simply be the one with the most votes wins, but they could still reveal the results region by region - they just need to ensure the bigger regions results are nearer the end.
Problem with that is that it will make Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland appear less significant. If you do regional voting you have to do it on an every region is equal basis or not at all - otherwise you end up in a political quagmire. Personally I think they are trying to recapture a retro vibe with the regional voting these days...
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Eurovision wise and the one semi-final was bad enough, never mind too. I think just the one is fine, but IMO it would be better as like a B-final where the prize for the top 10 or so is a slot in the main show for their country the next year, with the bottom 10 from the main show relegated to next years B-final.
The dual semi-final with no guaranteed places and random splitting is designed to get a better mix of countries into the final without actively trying to distort it by doing a dual time-zone type of thing. The previous format was beginning to favour certain blocks of countries getting through to the final - as the mix of 10 from the semi and 10 from the top winners from the previous year was favouring some regions. Whilst the winner is still the best song usually - the bloc voting was beginning to distort the make-up of the final quite heavily, with the influential Western European broadcasters not in the Big Four often not getting to the final in recent years, and countries threatened to pull out, as the final is the important show.
Now there are twice as many places up for grabs for the final compared to previous years, it could make it a lot more interesting.
I hope the Beeb show both semifinals - they only have to show one to comply with the EBU rules. (Which semi each Big Four country had to show was decided by a draw)
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Voting wise though it needs to go back to just the countries competing being able to vote, though I think the votes of none competing countries should be combined to form one more round of voting.
The problem with that is that it would reduce the audience commitment yet further. Why bother to watch the final if your country didn't make it AND you can't vote?
The whole point of Eurovision is that it unites the region in an egalitarian manner - meaning Malta and Germany have equal votes even though they are hugely different in size...
The problem with that is that it would reduce the audience commitment yet further. Why bother to watch the final if your country didn't make it AND you can't vote?
The whole point of Eurovision is that it unites the region in an egalitarian manner - meaning Malta and Germany have equal votes even though they are hugely different in size...
You would be able to vote though - it's just you'd be voting towards an "other" tally rather than just your own country. The privilege of getting a vote for your own country should be reserved for the entrants.
The problem with that is that it would reduce the audience commitment yet further. Why bother to watch the final if your country didn't make it AND you can't vote?
The whole point of Eurovision is that it unites the region in an egalitarian manner - meaning Malta and Germany have equal votes even though they are hugely different in size...
You would be able to vote though - it's just you'd be voting towards an "other" tally rather than just your own country. The privilege of getting a vote for your own country should be reserved for the entrants.
I think you're missing the point - it is a TV show after all.
Part of the draw of Eurovision is seeing YOUR judge deliver YOUR votes in the final, even if YOUR country isn't competing. You want to know how your country voted surely? The whole fun of the competition is still seeing how countries vote for each other.
If you lump all the non-competing countries together you are surely distorting the process and creating "second class" countries who don't have as much influence - effectively creating an invisible second contest for the non-participants. Again if flies in the face of the WHOLE point of Eurovision - which is Everyone is Equal (*).
(*) Apart - of course - from France, Germany, Spain and the UK (who bankroll the contest because of their large audiences and well off viewers!) Italy would be a member of this club too if they ever bothered to enter...
If you lump all the non-competing countries together you are surely distorting the process and creating "second class" countries who don't have as much influence - effectively creating an invisible second contest for the non-participants. Again if flies in the face of the WHOLE point of Eurovision - which is Everyone is Equal (*).
(*) Apart - of course - from France, Germany, Spain and the UK (who bankroll the contest because of their large audiences and well off viewers!) Italy would be a member of this club too if they ever bothered to enter...
The point is though everyone isn't equal - why should those who've not qualified have as much influence as those who have?
What you're saying is the same sort of logic that's led to schools cancelling sports days!
The voting system I'm basing my idea on is Big Brother Africa, which had housemates from 12 countries but was viewed in many more. For evictions each country represented by a housemate had one vote, with a thirteenth "neutral" vote compiled up of all the non-participating countries, which was also used to break any ties.
And now the voting process is so long people don't wait to see their country cast their vote - they've generally fallen asleep by then. It's also lost alot by only having the top 3 (or 5) votes revealed for each country.
If the other countries keep their own votes they shouldn't all be shown - they should just start the votes by compiling all theres together and putting the score on the score board, pointing to the website for the full breakdown and allowing those countries the time to reveal their votes to their own country.
If you lump all the non-competing countries together you are surely distorting the process and creating "second class" countries who don't have as much influence - effectively creating an invisible second contest for the non-participants. Again if flies in the face of the WHOLE point of Eurovision - which is Everyone is Equal (*).
(*) Apart - of course - from France, Germany, Spain and the UK (who bankroll the contest because of their large audiences and well off viewers!) Italy would be a member of this club too if they ever bothered to enter...
The point is though everyone isn't equal - why should those who've not qualified have as much influence as those who have?
Because they are members of the viewing public watching the show - just as everyone else is. That IS the point.
It is EUROPE (*) chosing the best song in EUROPE (*) - not just those in the final of the competition. The point is to be as inclusive as possible, not as divisive as possible. The point is that EUROPE (*) choses the song - not just bits of it...
In the days when every country competed every year it wasn't an issue. In the days when countries were relegated and couldn't compete (no semi to get through) they couldn't vote - and this was widely felt not to be in the interest of the contest, hence the move to a semi, which also combined with a massive increase in the number of entrants.
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What you're saying is the same sort of logic that's led to schools cancelling sports days!
No - as far as I know school sports days don't include voting? I'm not advocating everybody being able to enter the final irrespective of ability, nor am I advocating letting rubbish songs win because they'll feel left out if they don't.
What I AM advocating is continuing with the whole original ethos of the contest - which is to unite Europe in a competition where the entirety of Europe has a say. Thankfully the EBU is of the same mind - presumably for the same reasons.
To remove countries who didn't get through to the final from effectively voting in the final flies in the face of this and is deeply unfair.
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The voting system I'm basing my idea on is Big Brother Africa, which had housemates from 12 countries but was viewed in many more. For evictions each country represented by a housemate had one vote, with a thirteenth "neutral" vote compiled up of all the non-participating countries, which was also used to break any ties.
That isn't a system that would deliver effective rankings through the contest - it would just deliver a winner wouldn't it? Fine for a "chose 1 song from N songs" competition - but a non-starter for a "rank N songs in order of popularity" competition.
How would you deliver a decent leaderboard without letting "the others" distort it?
If you did the obvious and dumped the 18 non-competing countries into an "others" pile - they would be awarding 216, 180, 144 points (and 126 down to 1 en masse - so that they still gave their "12,10,8 etc." but multiplied by the number of countries whose votes make up that block ?
That would grossly distort the competition - as it creates a very influential, secret, mini-contest that could suddenly change the result. If it were done at the beginning it would give a song a ridiculously early lead, and rob the contest of the drama of seeing which song develops a lead through the voting....
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And now the voting process is so long people don't wait to see their country cast their vote - they've generally fallen asleep by then. It's also lost alot by only having the top 3 (or 5) votes revealed for each country.
Not true - often the voting gets a better audience than the singing... I agree that it has lost something by only the 8, 10 and 12 being announced with the 1-7 appearing on-screen only.
However with 43 countries to get through something has to be done to speed it up - and now we have IT systems that effectively remove the need for a sound (or sound and vision) link-up to deliver the voting it is really just a bit of showbiz/nostalgia. It is also now possible to establish lots of satellite circuits more quickly than it was previously - when the longer it took each country to deliver its votes the longer you had to establish the next circuit. (The first year they did it I think there were only 4 circuits up at a time - meaning that they couldn't line up the fifth result-giver until the first had finished...)
(I'm old enough to remember the days when it was sound only - and very exciting when they couldn't get through to countries and had to jump all over the place, sending the scoreboard into chaos!)
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If the other countries keep their own votes they shouldn't all be shown - they should just start the votes by compiling all theres together and putting the score on the score board, pointing to the website for the full breakdown and allowing those countries the time to reveal their votes to their own country.
You are missing the point - the voting is the bit people enjoy... Dumping the breakdown entirely to a website would reduce the jeopardy of the show - and web access is not universal in the viewing audience by any means. My gran, and I suspect my mum, isn't going to go to a website to see how the votes are coming in - she wants to know as she watches.
If Cyprus weren't through to the final - how would we know if they've given 12 points to Greece? How would we know if Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Finland, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia had continued with their bizarre voting if they weren't all in the final...?
(*) By EUROPE I mean the competitors in the Eurovision Song Contest - we all know that there are competitors from outside the strict geographical description of Europe (Israel is the obvious example)
This thread is sounding somewhat like the Liberal Democrats banging on about Proportional Representation.
While not suitable for application in British politics, it is certainly applicable to Eurovision.
Depends on what you mean by PR.
How do you define it in a Eurovision sense?
Is it numbers of votes cast by phone voters? (That would diminish the votes of small countries to the point of it being stupid - the numbers would be hilarious... Do you know how small Monaco, Andorra, San Morino etc. are?) How does that work when the juries kick in (which has happened quite a few times in the past if the phone votes go wrong or don't hit the required number to be deemed valid)
Is it a ranked result (so relative not absolute - gets round the jury vs phone vote issue) but weighted by population?
If that were the case - large countries would have a lot of influence, but would be penalised because they couldn't vote for themselves...
People don't seem to be thinking too clearly about this... There is a reason for the simple 12,10,8,7-1 voting - it almost defines the egalitarian nature of the contest - where no country is more or less important than any other. That is one of the reasons the show is so popular - even in small countries, in fact particularly in small countries. Where else do Monaco and Malta compete with Germany and the UK on an equal basis?
en masse - so that they still gave their "12,10,8 etc." but multiplied by the number of countries whose votes make up that block ?