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Eurovision 2024

BarryZola said:
I'll go back to my argument a couple of years back about these contests not having to cost the host country so much money (it was the World Cup football back then). These tournaments cost so much to host because people host them in such a way that they choose to spend more than needed. It's an arena with some music acts performing, and it's even televised so there must be money to be made from the broadcast rights. Adele and other artists can do a music show without television rights and make money out of it. What is the major malfunction with people that they can't even do a break-even music event that millions want to watch on TV and thousands will pay to attend in person? Where is the wasted money going?
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If you take us hosting last year. Cost was reported to be around 21-24 million. Depending on what source you read. We the tax payer, bought and hosted the entire thing. £8-16 million through the licence fee. £9-12 through the government. Merseyside police spent £3 million just to police the week.
 
Last year, the drain Eurovision put on available freelancers in TV was noticable. I picked up a lot of work because other people were taken out of circulation for a good month. :D So I can well believe those costs, on staffing alone!
 
If they're spending that much on just hiring staff then they need to cut back on some of the extravagance and simplify the event a bit. It's just a fancy singing contest in an arena that's also on the telly. But yeah, we're dealing with an industry that thinks it's a good idea to pay ex-footballers a million quid a year to talk about it on camera once a week, seemingly with no more insight than some random could come up with for 5% of the price. They could try not having stages that spin around and transform into a million different things in a couple of hours too. Like I say, so much money is wasted in industries like this and then they complain that they can't afford to do things. Yeah, because you're just throwing cash down the toilet! 👍 :tearsofjoy:
 
Obviously I didn't mean to imply that all of that cost was spent on staffing alone. More that the ammount of people involved, and the time they were involved for, gives a good indicator of the overall scale of the event. ;) The Britt Awards, for example, hardly makes a dent of the numbers of available freelancers. Eurovision meant everywhere was struggling to find crew.

.... To be clear, this is a good thing! Work is scarce these days, and the more big events, the better. Even if I don't personally work on them, I can pick up the slack. ;)

Getting back to Eurovision itself, I'm not sure how much of the cost is actually footed by the host these days? I get the feeling most of it comes from the EBU, the "big five", and sponsors that we never get to see on the BBC?
 
Problem is to do something that's entertaining and engaging costs money. I don't want to hear a randomer talk about football, I enjoy hearing from ex footballers who are experienced, have a rapport with their fellow presenters and have a knack for communicating with the audience. Of course this comes at a cost, and I don't necessarily agree with the sheer amount of money they're paid. That's for another topic which I'm fairly sure we've discussed on here before, but at the end of the day the wider market dictates what they're paid.

Similarly, I don't want to see a singer plonked on a stage singing their song, I want to be entertained. I want that whole crazy lighting and innovating staging as a whole package. The audience figures that Eurovision pulls in also shows that's what people want too.

Away from the spending, it's also now a huge opportunity for people in the industry to get together and work on what is a very prestigious event. The sheer complexity of it all is insane, so having involvement in that environment is a huge plus for future employment. Likewise, it's also become a showcase for new technology over the years too, especially for things like new lighting products - where it's now often used to premiere new products.

The world would be a very boring place if we didn't splash out on entertainment and controversy aside this year, I'm glad this little week of craziness is still with us.
 
Yeah, I get that it's a good thing for people working in the industry. I think I just like a good rant about wasted money, in general haha. You're probably right about who picks up the bill etc. I was responding earlier to a poster this morning who suggested that no-one wants to host it because in essence they lose money on hosting it, but later posts have suggested that this is no longer the case. I enjoyed my rant though, so it was all worth it in the end, for me ;):p

Edit - That was responding to Diogo.
 
Well said, @Craig It absolutely is a showcase for new technology, in all departments. And there's nothing better, as a techie, than having new toys to play with.... Except maybe having an almost unlimited budget to spend on hiring those new toys, so you can really see what they can do en mass.

A decade or so ago the fashion was to cover every inch of set in video wall, at the expense of actual lighting. Luckilly these days it looks like a good balance between the two has been struck. Screens and lights now compliment eachother, rather than compete for your attention.
 
On a similar note, I kept joking through the show that the shape and way they lit the trim of the stage looked like the Swiss flag. It even turnd Red and White before some of the acts.
 
We all know Eurovision is bent. Clearly last year, the Finnish act was the popular choice in the arena and on various social media outlets.

It is entirely by coincidence that the Sweden song won, so Sweden could host the event 50 years after abba won it.
 
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Slugjc said:
We all know Eurovision is bent. Clearly last year, the Finnish act was the popular choice in the arena and on various social media outlets.

It is entirely by coincidence that the Sweden song on so Sweden could host the event 50 years after abba won it.
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I think paying off all 36 national juries to get that result would be difficult.

But in terms of the voting, the same happened this year Croatia won the televote but Switzerland won the jury vote and the overall combined vote.
Same that we got 46 points from the jury as they could see that musically/technically its a good song, but the song didn't connect with the audience enough to be any any countries top ten televote.

Israel pretty much did buy televotes though, they ran adverts specifically targeting certain countries to try and get their vote, them coming second in the televote had nothing to do with the popularity of the actual song.
 
jon81uk said:
I think paying off all 36 national juries to get that result would be difficult.

But in terms of the voting, the same happened this year Croatia won the televote but Switzerland won the jury vote and the overall combined vote.
Same that we got 46 points from the jury as they could see that musically/technically its a good song, but the song didn't connect with the audience enough to be any any countries top ten televote.

Israel pretty much did buy televotes though, they ran adverts specifically targeting certain countries to try and get their vote, them coming second in the televote had nothing to do with the popularity of the actual song.
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I don't think any money exchanges hands. Everyone saw it happening prior to the votes. Former winner. Alot comparison between her and Abba in the build up. The narrative was deeply sewn.

What we are seeing with the televote is a displaced Europe. The amount of Ukrainians scattered around, being able to actually vote for Ukraine. Israel vote, ok they did the publicity, I would guess the amount who voted Israel, just to see how the EBU would have coped with the competition going there next year.
 
Slugjc said:
I don't think any money exchanges hands. Everyone saw it happening prior to the votes. Former winner. Alot comparison between her and Abba in the build up. The narrative was deeply sewn.
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Or Sweden is very good at writing excellent pop songs and appealing to the technical merits the jury look at. Whereas others are better at crowd-pleasing songs that get a strong phone vote. Look at Switzerland this year, 1st in the jury vote by a long way, but only fifth in the televote. Whereas last year Sweden was first in the jury vote and second in the televote. Does that mean this year was also rigged?

Slugjc said:
What we are seeing with the televote is a displaced Europe. The amount of Ukrainians scattered around, being able to actually vote for Ukraine. Israel vote, ok they did the publicity, I would guess the amount who voted Israel, just to see how the EBU would have coped with the competition going there next year.
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While I agree that displaced people provide a lot of the vote, the issue with Israel this year was definitely more than that, there were combinations of political voting (in the UK especially) and them spending money begging for votes.
 
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rob666 said:
Eurovision national voting has been a flipping swamp of local national bias for many, many years.
Nothing has changed, nothing will chanmge.
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There will always be neighbourly bias, but people sometimes oversimplify by complaining about "neighbours voting for neighbours" - it isn't simple though.

Taste is often a factor, with different regions of the continent having different ideas of what's good and what's bad. You might see a bloc all voting for each other and think it's favouritism based on proximity...until you take a look at their national music charts and see how similar they all are.

Another factor is that Eurovision is not a 3 show event, it doesn't last a week, it begins months before the semis begin. There is lots of crossover in media between neighbouring countries on the continent, and having friends and family scattered around your immediate region of Europe gives even more possibilities to hear about other acts.

The possibility of hearing, or seeing an act from another country is vastly increased, as is your chance to discover and fall in love with a song. ESC parties, events and concerts will often feature more artists from neighbouring countries (for obvious reasons) and it's not at all strange for artists that are genuinely very big in an entire section of Europe to participate solely for one country, but hoover up all the votes from surrounding nations.

Take me and Ireland's entry this year. I have family over there, they know I'm a bit of an ESC fan, so when Ireland's entry was selected a few messaged and shared it with me. I wasn't a huge fan at first but over time I grew to love it, until it ended up being my favourite act. Seeing the performance on the show solidified that, and I voted for it. Now, was I voting for a neighbour because they're my neighbour? No. But was being a neighbour and having connections to the country relevant to my vote? 100%.
 
QTXAdsy said:
"And here come the Belgians!"

Yep, Jeux Sans Frontieres coming back would be fantastic, far more fun than the song contests ever was however, it is a high cost show to put on, that is unless let's say EBU signs a deal with say a Netflix or Amazon Prime to help cover the costs then maybe we could be on for something.
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It's a Knockout and Jeux Sans Frontier were my favourite programs as a kid.

I remember being allowed to stay up and watch it (on what I think was a Friday evening)

Prime time viewing.


From: https://youtu.be/L2bTwSfWtsE?si=ElqtP8gOsbAHiurG



Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk
 
In Britain we don't really take as seriously as the rest of the continent does. We see it for what it is. A huge laugh and another excuse to crack the booze out. You may get commercial radio playing the entrant. Away from that. It's usually stuck away on BBC 1 and Radio 2. Who may play the other tracks. I'm with alot of people who would rather watch the show, without prior knowledge of how the tracks. I remember a year when Sonia performed 3/4 tracks in January and country voted for which one was best. Clearly that died a death.

I was in Barcelona 2 years ago. I was amazed at how serious the Spanish took and the amount of advertising that surrounds the event. One of the things that make the contest for me, is Graham Norton. Who was the perfect replacement for Terry Wogan.
 
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