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Juries coming back?
More information about Eurovision changes
In previous 'Have your say' articles, and in many reactions, Eurovision Song Contest fans and esctoday.com readers have called for a return to the jury system or a split between televote and jury votes.
esctoday.com has learnt that the results of the back-up jury will have more of an impact. Of the ten countries that will qualify from each semi final only the top nine countries are guaranteed to win a place in the final. The tenth country to qualify will be the highest ranked country from the back-up jury that has not already qualified through the televote.
This change clearly shows that Svante Stockselius' comments today that the EBU has "carefully listened to the suggestions of Members and fans and we took notice of the critical remarks in the press" is not without foundation. Many fans would like to see more jury involvement.
This move is expected to be popular with fans, and will be a further method to reduce the effect of diaspora voting at the Eurovision Song Contest. This in alignment with the two semi final system expected to reduce the impact of political or neighbourly voting, is likely to lead to a fairer overall qualification process.
Have your say on this proposed change to qualification from the semi finals in the reactions section below.
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@ Molly
There reason is back when there were juries, points were rarely awarded to eastern countries even if there song was great. Even in televoting there are western some countries that are biased against some eastern countries even though there sog is good, they wouldnt get a point from that country (eg. Ireland gave nothing to Turkey in 2003, and still never has given them the amount of points Turkey has give Ireland since they entered) Thats just one of many examples, see my point.
An awful lot of Eastern European nationals seem to dislike the return of the jury, I notice, I wonder why that might be (lol).
Something needed to happen. The jury vote does at least allow proper expression of quality. Albania's 2007 jury vote (although mad in some respects) gave Spain 12 points, and a lot of people liked DNASH so it was justifiable, and cancels out the fact that Spain clearly aren't going to get 12 points in a televote. Albania also awarded Ireland a few points, and Ireland clearly didn't deserve to score nothing, amusing though that might have been.
@Ruben
Today at least haöf the people in a family have a cell phone, so it doesn't have to be unfair.
But each country may decide that themselves. Germany, NL, Spain and Ireland will probably welcome that option.
HI everybody!
like the one guy guy below mentionned, it is not possible to realize the one vote per line rule. simply because of the fact, that, one, the ESC is a family event with several people watching it at one place together with a great diversity of oral taste but only one telephone, second, not every European country has the standart of mobile phones so that every memeber of the family is able to give their own vote and third, i think the EBU is earning money with the calls so that it would be contraproductive for them to limit the phone calls.
my prefered eurovision song contest would look like this:
- two semifinals broadcasted only in the countries taking part in it. either a west and east semi final , or a mixed final avoiding too many neighbour countriesto eschew the diaspora voting. So atleast the one half of the audience wont know the other half of the songs which regives the ESC a charme of the good old years.
- every eurovision country broadcasts the final and every country is allowed to vote, BUT: to avoid the neighbour voting like in the future, all the countries that didn't manage to overstep the treshold to the final, will be counted together as a eurovision voice! all calls in all countries will be counted together not in total numbers of the callers but proportional so that the Maltese vote is as valuable as the Polish vote for example. So, every country taking place has a vote and the rest of Europe will give ONE vote. maybe with a doubled point value ( 16, 20 and 24), but that s discussable.
and my last wish: all points from 1 up to 12 points should be mentioned again. to eb honest, the show lives from part three, the giving of points. its the best part of the show! and all people around me are disappointed with the 1-7 given and 8 to 12 presenting rule. u cant celebrate your 5 points and so only standing there for 3 seconds. ( me as a german, we recently are happy about 5 points 
)
that will mean, that the competing countries should be reduced again to a total number of 24 or 26 countries in the final.
that would be so great. do it like that and everybody will be happy. ^^
one call per line is essential in Ireland.
for the past 2 years and in the eurovision dance contest Ireland has give 10 point to Poland and 12 to Lithuania.
that my friends is certainly not a coincidence! it is because Poles and Lithuanians are voting 10 and 20 times for their country - and why wouldn't they. But one vote per line and the problem is solved!
Good idea, it seems that the ESC team in Geneva has been working hard the past month.
@ Kevin Knight
"...most people who bloc vote, probably only make 1 call anyway
they vote once, they vote for their neighbour..."
A lot of emigrants tends to vote "much more" than one time for their native country. One of the main reasons why for example the former Yugoslavia countries distribute most of their points among themselves is because their populations are mixed. A lot of Serbs live in Montenegro; Croats in Serbia; and so on. There are some people who don't hesitate to make 10 phone calls or even more for their native country or a country with which they have other personal connections and these people have a big influence on the voting result.
Again from me: Hallelujahhhh...........
the 1 cal per phone rule is rubbish
1) last year there were 5 votes from my house
1 from me
1 from my brother
1 from my sister
1 from my mum
1 from my dad
we all have different opinions, and it wouldnt be fair to let us only make 1 call
and 2) most people who bloc vote, probably only make 1 call anyway
they vote once, they vote for their neighbour
this will do next to nothing to solve the problem of immigrant voting. We'll all be here next year with the same complaints. Mr Stockselius just won't tackle the big issue, will he?
What I think speaks for the juries, is the fact that the logic in thei work is so different from the televoting. They stop at each song to consider if it is good mediocre or bad. Very different from people deciding on one or two favourites to vote for by phone. That is what appeals to me in combining jury work with televoting.
However, if the juries are to have input in the results again, they should be much larger than the easily corruptable groups of 11 people that we had before.
Mischa is partly right, but telephones in households are used by several people, so 2 or 3 calls per phone may be better (just hope my sister doesn't find out so I can vote 3 times and she can't vote at all, hahaha). But only one per cell phone!
1996 was the best system/ get rid of the crap before it even gets to Belgrade. One evening is easy on the viewers, and much cheaper for competiters (that dont make it to the finals)
(well, at least two semis reasonably fair , much better than the idiotic system they had until now)
only one call per line .. the only way to make it better ..
There is going to be an even bigger backlash against the big 4 now that they alone are guaranteed a place in the final. They could have Elton John or Placido Domingo singing and they still wouldn't get sufficient votes. If they want the chance to do well again they are going to have to bite the bullet and go through qualifying like everyone else.
@ Danniella
I think you mis-interpreted what I said, I'm okay with the first 9 qualifing, but the 10th country in the top 10 has to go through with some kind of ordeal.
Paul G,
At some point I thought of the same system as you, pooling all the countries that are not in the final to give one set of points all together, perhaps so that they would give a set of double points, not 12 but 24, not 10 but 20 etc. That would really increase the excitement towrds the end! but I do not believe that will happen. For example, we do not know the finalists before the semifinal but arrangments for the announcement of each country's votes --such as spokespersons, studios and satellite links-- must be fixed long before. I do not think the boradcasting corporations want to do that work in vain. Also: for the frustrated viewers in the countries that did not qualify, it is nice to see at least some contribution to the show from their own country even if it is only the announcement of the points.
TOOOOOOOOOOO MUCH BAD NEWS IN 1 DAY!
I also think it would be very unfair that each of the 25 finalists will have as much power as all the non-qualifying. But presenting all their votes at a time would be too much in too little time.
The voting must be even more reduced, each country could be given max 40 seconds to present their votes. Remember, in 2008 there will probably be 44 countries competing.
Not sure I like the idea of the back up juries deciding the 10th spot, you might as well just let there be a 50/50 split - that would be fairer.
I only hope to god that he has listened to the fans and that there will be 26 votes announced on the final.
"26" you cry "Why 26" the reason I would like to see 26 votes fully cast is this:- 42 countries with the current voting is ridiculous so let the 25 finalists vote in full (bring back the excitement) and then the others that have not qualified have all their votes put together and then ranked in order as normal 1 to 8 10 then 12 and a spokesperson gives out the votes on behalf of the non qualifiers
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@ Michael UK I agree but this is yes a welcome step in the right dircetion...very pleased 
2008 will be a much better year we hope.......
this is a step in the right direction but just a small step, we need more jury influence and just the finalists to vote also, so we can have the full votes announced properly and not the dumbed down version w e ve had for 2 years
here here Euro Sheep
That is an idiotic idea! Hate it...
i have to say BRILLIANT SVANTE again! 50% jury, 50% public votes is really fair, and should make the contest less predictable! yay a step in the right direction! i thought id never say this but Svante could really make the contest more pleasurable! i think its a great money and the EBU still rakes in loads more money for televotes! yay!
Finally a step in the right direction... but it won't mean that much. Neighbour and diaspora voting will still continue, although we can only hope the final outcome will benefit from this new set-up. If EBU wants to make the ESC fair again, they should put in a few more rules: only the countries that take part in 1 semi final will get the chance to vote for that final, so a lot of neighbours will be out of the picture vote-wise... and only 1 vote can be registered per phone line. That's the only way to make it fair again!
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