The jury is back for ESC 2009 Final

eurovision.tv reports:

During a meeting in Moscow, the EBU Reference Group of the Eurovision Song Contest decided to introduce a voting model of a mix between televoting and jury votes in the 2009 Final.

No change will be made in the voting during the Semi-Finals of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Details on the balance between jury and televoting outcome are still to be determined in the months to come.

A survey amongst delegation heads from represented countries revealed that a majority is in favor of such mixed model.
A mixed voting system also has great support amongst the fans of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Svante Stockselius, Executive Supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest said:

"Nothing is more democratic than the vote of the public. But a jury takes the opportunity to listen to the songs several times, before they make up their minds. In Belgrade, we saw a difference in judgment of the public and the back-up juries, and we believe a combination will make the show more interesting."

In its next meeting, later this year, the Reference Group will decide upon the exact way the jury has to be composed, and to discuss rules to assure a fair jury vote.

The Semi-Finals will not see any changes in the voting procedure. As at the 2008 contest, televoters will again decide upon the nine songs that qualify in each of the two Semi-Finals, while the highest ranked entry of the back-up juries that didn't qualify yet through televoting will also qualify.


read also: Eurovision 'Big Four' final spots confirmed

Moscow officialy accepted as Host City for the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest

The Reference Group of the Eurovision Song Contest has officially approved the Russian capital as the Host City of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest, as proposed by Channel One.

The governing body of the song contest also approved the Olympiski Arena as the venue of the event in May 2009.

Svante Stockselius, EBU's Executive Supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest, said to Eurovision.tv:

"Moscow is an impressive city and the proposed venue gives us the fantastic possibility to put everything under one roof. We are confident that Channel One Russia will organize a fantastic 54th Eurovision Song Contest."

The green light of the Reference Group gives the Host Broadcaster the opportunity to go full speed ahead with their preparations for the upcoming contest.

In the months ahead, Channel One organizers are to make numerous important decisions, from the creative concept of the event to the practical details of the cooperation with the city of Moscow and many, many others.



source:eurovision.tv
credit photo

Eurovision 2009 under threat after Russian invasion of Georgia

Next year's Eurovision Song Contest is under threat after ex-Soviet states called for a boycott after Russia invaded Georgia.

Russia's Dima Bilan won the 2008 contest thanks to ex-pats in former Soviet-bloc states banding together to vote for him.

As a result, the 2009 contest will take place in Moscow.

But Baltic nations Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia may pull out of the annual TV show.

A poll in Estonia has already backed the boycott, while pressure is also rising for a Polish withdrawal.

Estonia's culture minister Laine Janes, said: "Solidarity must exist with Lithuania and Latvia to show consolidated support for Georgia."

The European Broadcasting Union, who run Eurovision, have said the Georgian conflict cannot be allowed to wreck the contest.

Spokesman Svante Stockselius said: "These issues should not be linked. We are organising a non-political event and if the hosting country is able to ensure the safety of participants there is no reason why it should not be allowed to host the finals."

The potential eastern boycott is another problem for Eurovision, who are already struggling to allay the fears of the western countries that they now no longer have a chance in the contest.

Sir Terry Wogan confirmed last month he would be stepping down as the BBC's Eurovision host after 37 years. The 70-year-old presenter has tired of the "political voting" that determined the outcome.

source

Heads of delegation meeting in Belgrade

The Heads of the Delegations of 43 countries participating in the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest will meet in Belgrade, on 17-18 March.



During the meeting, the Host Broadcaster will present its plans and prepare the heads of delegations for the upcoming contest. The draw for the starting order of the participants willl take place at the Sava Centre on Monday, 17 March. At the end of January, it was decided by a draw which countries will compete in Semifinal 1 and Semifinal 2.

FIRST SEMIFINAL:
Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Moldova, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, San Marino and Slovenia. Ten countries will qualify for the Final.

SECOND SEMIFINAL:
Albania, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, FYR Macedonia, Georgia, Hungary, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and Ukraine. Ten countries will qualify for the Final

FINAL:France, Germany, Serbia, Spain and the United Kingdom.

The draw for the starting order will be broadcast live on RTS and through the official 2008 Eurovision Song Contest website eurovision.tv

source:RTS

later edit: The Cypriot Broadcasting Corporation will broadcast live the draw from Sava Center in Belgrade.

source:esctime.com

Eurovision Song Contest 2008 format

eurovision.tv reports:

SIX POTS

To determine which country will be represented in which Semi-Final, a draw will take place in late January. Based on research conducted by the EBU’s tele-voting partner Digame, analyzing the voting of the Eurovision Song Contest since 2004, the participating countries will be divided into six pots to avoid returning voting patterns.

BIG FOUR Countries

Each broadcaster will of course have to broadcast the Semi-Final they are taking part in. Broadcast of the other Semi-Final is optional. Host country Serbia and the so called Big Four-countries Spain, France, the United Kingdom and Germany, are automatically qualified for the Final. It was decided that each of the qualified Finalists will have to broadcast and vote in one of the Semi-Final, along with those countries that are taking part in it. Broadcast of the other Semi-Final is optional. By draw, also late January, it will be decided which two of the Big Four-countries will broadcast and vote in the first Semi-Final, and which two in the second Semi-Final. Finally, a draw will determine in which Semi-Final the host country will be able to vote. The draw for the running order of the two Semi-Finals and the Final will take place during the Heads of Delegation meeting in mid-March.

BACKUP JURIES

In each Semi-Final, the top-9 from the public televoting results will qualify for the Final. The highest ranked back-up jury participant that did not qualify for the Final at the public tele-voting will also qualify for the Final. This means in each Semi-Final, 10 participants will qualify for the Final, bringing the total number of participants in the Final to 25. The voting in the Final will remain unchanged and all participating countries, including those who did not qualify for the Final, will be able to vote.

Svante Stockselius, the EBU’s Executive Supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest, said to Eurovision.tv: "We are confident that the approved format revisions will take the Eurovision Song Contest to a higher level, by adding exciting elements and, above all, by making the competition more fair and the results more credible."

First Semifinal: Tuesday, 20.05.2008

Second Semifinal : Thursday, 22.05.2008

Final: Saturday, 24.05.2008

The preliminary date for rehearsals to start is Sunday 11th of May and the preliminary opening date for the press centre and accreditation desk is Saturday 10th of May.

Svante Stockselius explains the new format

Eurovision.tv reports:

Svante STOCKSELIUS, Executive Supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest on behalf of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), gives more details about the revised format. Before the weekend, Eurovision.tv announced that two Semi-Finals will take place to find the Finalists of the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest.

You might ask yourself, when are those two Semi-Finals taking place? "The details are yet to be decided upon, but the proposal is based on the idea that the two Semi-Finals of the 2008 Eurovision Song Contest will be aired simultaneously on Thursday, 22nd of May from Belgrade, Serbia. If the two Semi-Finals will both be recorded, whereas only the results will be broadcast live, or if one of the Semi-Finals will be aired live and the other one recorded, is unknown yet," Svante STOCKSELIUS explains.

"Each Semi-Final is only being aired in the countries that are taking part, and only viewers from countries that take part in each respective Semi-Final can vote," he adds. All participating broadcasters can broadcast the Semi-Final(s) they are not taking part in later as well, and the Semi-Finals will be webcasted live through Eurovision.tv. To serve the fans, both Semi-Finals will also be made available on-demand the next day. "To produce the two Semi-Finals live on different nights will result in high extra costs for both the Host Broadcaster and the participating Members," STOCKSELIUS explained.

To qualify for the Final

Another possible change that is currently being considered is that From each Semi-Final, the top-9 ranked countries of the tele-voting qualify for the Final, to be aired live from Belgrade on the 24th of May. In each Semi-Final, the highest ranked country of the back-up juries that it not in the top-9 yet will receive a wildcard to the Final as well. In total, 10 countries per Semi-Final qualify for the Final, bringing the total amount of Finalists to 25. "Usually, the results from the tele-voters and the back-up juries are not very different. However, this procedure, if it should be decided upon, adds extra excitement to the show and gives the back-up jury a more prominent meaning. It is also an answer to the many requests we received to use a mixed tele-voting/jury system," STOCKSELIUS says.

More details about the final decisions of new format and the draw for the running order of each Semi-Final will be revealed later.

source and photo:eurovision.tv

Online petition for EBU to reveal the back-up jury votes

eurovisionthoughts.blogspot.com reports

To: Svante Stockselius & the European Broadcasting Union:

We, the fans of the Eurovision Song Contest, are not happy with the, currently, unfair nature of the voting system. We feel that the voting result of, not only the eastern countries, but the western nations as well, are being adversely affected by the number of immigrants in each country.

It has become a tradition that Germany will always award Turkey 12 points, this could be interpreted as suspicious as the largest population of immigrants in Germany are from Turkey.

The same is happening in all of the Eurovision countries. Ireland has for the last two years given 12 points to Lithuania in the final.

This is also highly suspicious because the highest population of immigrants in Ireland are from Poland and the second highest number are from Lithuania, seeing as Poland was not in the final (but was awarded 10 points in the semi-final) 12 points to Lithuania demonstrates that Ireland's vote may well have been again swayed by the largest immigrant groups of Ireland voting for their own country.

These are just two exaples of what seems to be skewed voting caused by immigrants voting for their home nation while resident in another competing country.We want the results of the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest national back up juries to be made public so that a comparison can be made between them and the actual televote results.

This petition is in no way against the Serbian win, and we feel that it may well have occurred even if jury voting was still in place, what we are aiming for is to highlight the inequality that exists between competing nations in the ESC at present.

Our final goal is to see thee reintroduction, either in full or partially, of the national juries. Many, so called, 'Western nations' are at real threat of withdrawing within the next few years if something is not done to assuage their and their national viewing public fears when it comes to immigrants hijacking their countries voting ability. We do not feel in any way that this is a racist accusation or indeed a racist measure that we are proposing, we only want each country's vote to actually put across that country's views on all competing songs.

Eurovision Thoughts

Sign the petition

Svante Stockselius meets members of OGAE Serbia

Two days ago, members of OGAE Serbia met the supervisor of Eurovision Song Contest, Mr. Svante Stockselius.

Mr. Stockselius came to Belgrade to get to know with the host city of Eurovision Song Contest 2008. During his stay, Mr. Stockselius visited Belgrade Arena, Sava Centre (potential place for the press area) and Expo Centre (potential place for Euroclub).

Mr. Stockselius expressed his delightment with Belgrade, Arena and Sava centre, saying that there are all conditions for having an event like ESC and added that he thinks that the next year's event will be very successful.

Mr. Stockselius also met the head managers of RTS and the people who will be responsible who organising of the event and had a serie of meetings with them. He said that he thinks that there is a team of professional, creative and capable people in RTS who will be able to bring out such a demanding task like an organisation of ESC.

Members of OGAE Serbia also introduced some ideas to mr. Stockselius and expressed their willingness in organising the events connected with fans. Mr. Stockselius said he's very pleased with the ideas the fans in Serbia have and added that he hopes they'll be brought out in the cooperation of RTS and OGAE Serbia. The head of Serbian delegation and the music editor of RTS, Ms. Anja Rogljic, expressed her satisfaction with the RTS' cooperation with OGAE Serbia in Helsinki and added RTS will its' best for Eurovision Song Contest's good organisation.

Mr. Stockselius also mentioned some general things about the ESC. He said that, in the case of Italy's coming back, there will be BIG 5 and the method of voting will stay the same. As for the infamous theme of "East" and "West", Mr. Stockselius said that former Eastern European countries put much more in the quality of their songs and added he isn't surprised they do very well at the contest.

source:oikotimes.com

Beogradska Arena - Photos

Svante Stockselius, the supervisor of the Eurovision Song Contest, visits Belgrade this week to provide Serbian broadcaster RTS with all information regarding the organisation of next year's contest.

Svante Stockselius visits Belgrade and RTS

from oikotimes.com


Marija Serifovic's win at the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest has brought much joy to the people of Serbia, but it also implies obligations and responsibilities. Svante Stockselius, the supervisor of the ESC, has come to Belgrade to provide the Serbian Broadcasting Corporation with the details of the tasks to be performed. Mr Stockselius talked to the head people of the RTS, visited the Sava Centre and the Expo Centre, the possible venues for the press centre and the fan club, and the Belgrade Arena where the 2008 ESC will take place.

Mr Stockselius was very impressed by Belgrade. 'It is a beautiful city, full of greenery. I was given a wonderful reception. The Belgrade Arena is impressive. It is neither too big, nor too small, which is perfect because we need a certain amount of intimacy, ' said Mr Stockselius. The supervisor of the ESC is satisfied with the way things are going. He pointed out that the RTS should be aware of the fact that there is a lot of work to be done. The RTS Entertainment Department will have the leading role in carrying out the project.