The official rules for the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 have been released, and there’s one very notable addition: the EBU now specifically has the ability to change the jury/televote ratio.
In part 11.3, this section has been added:
The points of the National Juries and of the National Audiences shall be combined according to a ratio which is determined by the EBU, subject to Reference Group approval.
For example, if the ratio is 50-50, the points of the National Jury carry the same weight as the points of the National Audiences.
While there is nothing to suggest that the ratio will change for 2017, the process for this happening in the future has been set out in the rules.
Since the joint jury and televote system was introduced in 2009, the vote has been evenly split between the two groups. However, in recent years there have been calls to change the ratio after some notable differences in voting.
In 2015, Il Volo won the televote but ranked only third overall after placing sixth in the jury rank.
In Stockholm, Sergey Lazarev similarly won the televote, but placed third overall when juries only ranked him fifth.
And most notably, Michal Szpak placed third in the televote, but was an incredibly low 25th with juries, giving him an overall placing of eighth.
The rules for 2017 also set out the new system of presenting the results, specifying that spokespeople will present the jury points, followed by the show hosts revealing the combined televote results.
But the rules also leave the possibility of this changing in future, with a new section advising that “The exact way of presenting the results during the Shows and/or calculating the points shall be decided in common agreement between the Host Broadcaster and the EBU Permanent Services and subject to the approval the Reference Group”.
However, given the successful and dramatic finale of Eurovision 2016, it seems unlikely that the EBU would change the new system.
What do you think of the rule change? Should the jury/televote ratio be adjusted? Share your thoughts below.
Nooooo, please don’t! If you do this Eurovision will turn into what it used to be before 2009, full of circus and joke acts. Quality entries will be much less and they will have no chance to do well. Certain countries will always qualify no matter what they send, just because of neighbour and diaspora voting!
More power to televoters = Less creditable contest!
@bro thank you for the insult, says a lot about your character 🙂 And, please. This system of choosing faves by irrational reasons is EXACTLY the reason why we need unbiased juries to stay professional and fair insteas of having a voting in the end which was lead by countries voting for their neighbors.
Juries can give 1-6 points, while televoters 1-12. It would be more just. And yes, the number of juries is very small. As we have seen, one Danish jury could decide the fate of a lot of points. What about two juries? So their impact should be decreased. 10 juries maybe?
If this changes at all then we will know it was changed to support the sour pusses Russia and Poland that missed out because of the Jury votes.
Lets face it televoters should never be given the opportunity take over the voting fully, because they don’t vote for the best song it politically motivated at times as was 2016
The jury votes are important so that it brings some proffesionality and honesty into the judging otherwise it would be a farse.
Televoters can never be trusted to choose the best act on the night.
Leave the ratio as it is, the juries are needed to keep the block/diaspora televoting in check. As I suggested before, instead of all the jury members voting together in the same room, why not sequester each juror in a separate room during the jury shows? That way, each member can judge the performances based on their own interpretation of the voting criteria and it would cut down on the collusion (ie: the Russian jury during semi 1)
Putting any ratio regarding the value of the jury an televote (with the exceptions of 100:0 and 50:50) is going to further complicate the process and cause even more anger with the community.
Let it remain as is.
Best model 2/3 televote and 1/3 points from juries (if stay 5 members). To prevent diaspora and neighbous voting instead 20 SMS from 1 phone , 1 or max 3 SMS from one phone.
Riva
From 2012 almost every year juries push winner. They gave 2 victory for Sweden , 1 for Ukraine (juries and EBU try so hard for victory of Australia or Ukraine second choice and juries prevet to Russia win in 2012, 2015, 2016. Juries push so hard in points every year Sweden, Australia, Malta, Azerbaijan, Israel,Italy, and in last 2-3 uear and The Netherlands, Belgium . Juries dont like Poland, San Marino
@Polegend Godgarina Wow, wow, wow! What shall I first comment on? Don’t call Il Volo’s crap quality music. That is just recycled pop opera. A love ballad sung in Italian… how original, right? Sweden may have not been a winner but it was a million times better than Italy. In my opinion, Polina should have won, her song was a masterpiece and my favorite Eurovision song ever. But if I have to choose between Sweden and Italy, then it’s by far Sweden! Do you remember Aminata? Talent, originality, flawless vocals, a mind-blowing song. All this was included in Latvia’s entry.… Read more »
Power to the people 😉
Yeah let the people vote for the crap that entertains while unbothered to actually understand and appreciate great music quality … The only reason I can see the ratio weight towards the televote is the fact that people pay to vote … but at the same and I’ve said this before … one only votes (AKA one only wastes money), because one wants to … losing the grip and acting like a hysterical teen girl or a football fan after one’s personal choice has not won (hi, Il Di…ops Il Volo)… let me see …. how can I put this… Read more »
Televoting is good, but you can’t deal with diasporas/immigrants and block-voting;
Jury system is good to topple down gimmickness and bad vocals, but corrupted and juries are people too, not machines. It might look like US elections this year. But I believe EBU had to make corrections because with separate and visible jury results displeasure would only rise so it would affect even incoming cash from televote in future.
Sounds good to me. Even a 60% televote 40% jury vote would be great.
@ Héctor – when will you guys understand that Sergey won the televote because EVERY damn European country voted for him. The least he got was 3 points from the Netherlands. Heck, even countries like Iceland with virtually no Russians gave him stellar scores. I dislike his song but, ex-URSS or not, he was going to win anyway.
@ (J)ESC Fanatic – lmao bye, nobody would waste their money if it was only 25% televoting. And don’t talk about quality entries not standing a chance when in 2015 the televote was won by Italy’s song, while the juries voted for the generic EDM trash that was Heroes. The juries clearly don’t know any better. As for the circus acts, we only had 2-3 per year. And they were often good: Lithuania 2006 was a masterpiece, for example.
How about 100% televote like in the good ole days?
@Napaw IQ=0? The best song is the one the most people like. There is no other way of determining what is the best of a kind if no objective criteria are applicable.
Good idea. 5 members of juries give 50% is not fair and milions televoters give another 50%. Increase members of juries from 5 to 16 like in 80 ties (4 group from 16 to 25 years old, from 25 to 35, from 35 to 45 , from 45 , 1 member woman 1 members man in all 4 group) and keep 50% or if we have only 5 members they must only have 25% maximum 33%power in voting
@Héctor to what things? How come ever Ira Losco would make it to the top10 in the jury voting? What do Lithuanian jury members pay attention to? Remember the Danish jury who mixed up the points? What if there were two of such jurors? Look at the youtube statistics, at radio rotations, at spotify statistics etc… Why would a few corrupt people decide the winner instead of viewers?
Changing voting ratio would only benefit the block and diaspora voting. Sergey winning and Poland placing 3rd? Seriously? Better the way it is now! It’s normal the jury and the televote disagree, they pay attention to different things.
Not a good idea, a voting system like this only leads to people voting for the act that they personally like (for their looks etc), voting for political reasons and diaspora, rather than a fair vote for the best song or performance.
Poland this year is the best example.
keep it 50/50 or else we’ll revert to 2000s trash. make the jury more credible instead.
As I said before they need rework jury vote system to become transparent and visible. There sholudn’t be any group involvement (not even NDA). That means juries won’t know each other at all, there’ll be audited solo sessions proven by videodocumenting and revealed in the very show. Yes, they still have window to move (esp in small countries where pros know each other and pretty limited) and make beloved upvotes against or for countries or fellows they know, but that’ll will be out of ESC, so EBU won’t have to response for that.
No, no, no and NO! This system we got in 2016 is great and we don’t need Il Crappo or countries with big diasporas to win!
Giving more power to the people? OMG, that would be a step backwards in my opinion. Thanks to juries (who generally have much better music taste than public) we can avoid so big impact of diasporas voting all over Europe. Of course, jury institution is not perfect and there should be some changes, however thanks to it we have much more better songs high in the final scoreboard. I really don’t want the same countries in the top 5 every year just because of neighbours voting (I mean Russia, Ukraine, former Yugoslavia or Scandinavia countries) etc. To be honest, for… Read more »
75% jury and 25% televote would be the best voting system!
@danielvarga
Me too! 🙂
Nooooo, please don’t! If you do this Eurovision will turn into what it used to be before 2009, full of circus and joke acts. Quality entries will be much less and they will have no chance to do well. Certain countries will always qualify no matter what they send, just because of neighbour and diaspora voting!
More power to televoters = Less creditable contest!
As far as I know, Szpak’s result has an explanation: he badly performed in the jury final (at least, this was what came to my ears during the hours before the big night). He performed very well in the televised night.
100 televote, 0 juries would be the best idea
… And that should NEVER be changed, except to give more importance to the jury vote. Seriously, the public has no taste, just look at the winners from the 100% televote era (Dima Bilan, no need to say more). The juries might not be perfect but are way less biased by geo-political matters.
The only time I disagreed with the juries was 2015, I preferred Il Volo to Mans. Apart from that year, I was always way more in line with the juries.
Agree with James: Keep the 50/50 ratio!
i don’t really care but it’s quite weird to see how people were so against removing the juries 6 months ago to now where everyone doesn’t want the juries to be removed
I don’t think it would change something… I personally think that the voting system should be composed by televote and the vote of the artists which vote for each other secretly… it would be fairer
Either keep it as is or increase the jury weight, but increasing the televote would be a massive mistake as we saw in the ’00s.
I don’t think it’ll be step in the right direction. I’d rather see increasing jury members per country (for example to 10) instead of giving more power to televote. It might end up in returning to ‘quality’ of entries in early 2000s. For me the best voting system was the one used between 2009-2012 (before Swedes started to mess up the contest…
I am really starting to miss the old years… this is becoming not-fun anymore
scrutinizing the result is already so hard as it is and people want to throw ratios into thre mix… NO THANKS.
scrutinizing the result
I agree with a lot of the concerns here. Changing the ratio seems like more a quick fix rather than an actual, tangible solution to the problem. The problem with a lot of the juries, I feel, is that a lot of them do not keep in line with the expectations held of them from the public, and I’m not referring to who they vote for, but rather how. The past two years we’ve a few scandals that diminish the overall impression of how ‘professional’ the people in the juries and those who manage them are. There is a necessity… Read more »
I want only one thing from the old voting system: the 8 and 10 points to be announced by the spokespersons!!!
I rather they keep the ratio 50-50. It’s always either the jury or the public vote who gets their way everytime anyway, and it’s miracle when they agree on the same thing.
Allowing one to have greater weigh than the other could ultimately affect the quality of the songs submitted for the contest in succeeding editions.
@Zack
Same here. I preferred Sweden over Italy in 2015 and preferred Australia over Russia in 2016.
After 5 years of watching the ESC, I tend to agree more with the juries than the public. Quality beats cheap efforts (although fun trashy-pop).