On Saturday, Malta’s young star Destiny took home a seventh-place finish at Eurovision 2021. While it was Malta’s best result since 2005, the delegation had clearly been aiming for a higher result, with the broadcaster spending months campaigning. Now Maltese government minister Carmelo Abelo has announced that broadcaster TVM‘s Eurovision 2021 budget will undergo an audit. This follows reports in the Maltese media that local broadcaster PBS invested public money on betting agencies.
The Times of Malta reports that an insider flagged Abelo about potential misconduct from Malta’s public broadcaster PBS and its channel TVM. The insider reported that foreign nationals had been given money in exchange to bet on Malta. As a result of this, the insider claims that Malta’s Eurovision 2021 bid rose to the top of the odds. This fact helped to advertise the Maltese entry as the “bookies’ favourite”.
A country’s odds shorten if people bet on its entry. Especially early betters determine much of the premature odds.
Back in April, data from Smarkets revealed that exchanging and trading in Malta’s odds steeply rose shortly before its song reveal. Nonetheless, it should be pointed out that there was also genuine fan excitement around the release of Malta’s song.
Reports suggest that PBS invested in promotional campaigns for Eurovision 2021
However, the Times of Malta reports that PBS did not only try to increase its chances by betting. The newspaper claims that the broadcaster also spent money on sponsored content for social media influencers.
In the lead up to Eurovision, several people noticed that large news sites published paid editorials about Malta’s entry, including LGBT+ news site PinkNews, Romanian newspaper Ziarul Financiar and several other European tabloids. Most of these outlets tagged the articles as “sponsored content”.
Several foreign celebrities also showed support for the entry. For example, German singer Cascada used the Maltese promotional hashtag #destinedforgreatness in an Instagram post, promoting the entry.
The Maltese delegation started an ad promotion campaign on social media which did not go past unnoticed in the Eurovision fan community. In a Twitter ad, it told users to vote for the Maltese entry. This advertisement gave the exact instructions on how to vote on Malta in the native language of the location of the receiver.
Some YouTube users also found they were served Destiny’s entire semi-final performance of “Je me casse” as a pre-roll advertisement.
In 2016, Maltese journalists also called for an investigation after reports surfaced that the budget for Eurovision had been increased multiple times. PBS denied this request then.
Minister Abelo has announced that the audit and investigation will be launched by next Monday.
it is sexism. Gjon literally half way into the jury voting said “im already the winner” and people clap, because a man who knows what he wants is ambitious but a woman saying the same is arrogant
Malta is a small country. I think, apart from financial services, tourism is a big deal for Malta. And especially during the Corona locdowns it is tough for a lot of businesses in that sector. I think they were trying to win Eurovision in order to boost the tourism businesses. It is essential for their survival to advertise themselves and attract events and travellers.
To me, Je me casse is the best maltese entry ever and one of the best eurovision songs ever, as well. Genuine, fun, original. Destine is talented. I feel bitter from the result but that’s life. The only thing I find frustrating is to spend taxpayers money on betting to shorten the odds and become a favourite. Advertising is ok given it is done in a fair way. But manipulating the odds, it’s unacceptable. Of course, I feel that many many countries have done it so far, and during the previous years, it’s a practice in the market. And it… Read more »
If you, can’t, win it
Spend some cash.
*musical breakdown*
this is all embarrassing, they really thought people could be brainwashed that easily with fake hype… and all they ended up doing is setting huge expectations on a 18 year old girl and letting her down in the end.
I bet this audit is only happening now because Malta lost. If Malta had won Eurovision, there would be no need to investigate.
X-factor Malta 2 was a pure joke. We knew since the very beginning who was going to win.
Modern day nazis gave their opinion… who cares. Belarus is doomed anyways.
Some fans are naive as hell. Malta did this for years and y’all still fell for the fake hype.
Destiny is the biggest victim here. For months, if not years, she has been surrounded by people (from the broadcaster, perhaps her label too) that tried everything to make her win. Therefore, anything other than the victory would be a major disappointment. It almost seems of Maltese national interest to do well at ESC, as it is essentially the only global stage on which they can be competative. 7th place is actually not a bad result, many countries would kill for such a ranking. But, again, Destiny is only 18 years old, you can’t blame her for believing in her… Read more »
Whenever her manager makes a statement on the situation it always sounds like he is trying to throw Destiny under the bus. Implying she wasn’t talented enough to win on her own
As a Maltese person i just wanna say that I’m tired of the authorities taking over the song choice process and manipulating it however they want to. It is clear that it has become a matter of sending a singer BECAUSE they’re a good singer, and it all revolves around the singer, not around the song. It should be the other way round. As for funding, first off the authorities should actually spend money on songs that we the Maltese want to represent us, secondly they need to stop over-advertising the song. If a song is good and genuine, it… Read more »
After reading this, I feel embarrased of myself since I believed all the way that Je me casse was a strong contender for the victory. And when I was reading comments here on Wiwibloggs and other sites of people saying Je me casse was overrated and got too much hype, I didn’t think much of it since every year there will be people who dislike the winner and that’s just how opinions are. But I feel extremely sad for Destiny though. She is such a talented girl, got a deserved JESC-victory in 2015 and did bring Malta their best result… Read more »
I probably should have specified that I did feel sad for Destiny because she is now in all of this messy situation that the Maltese team has caused 😉
I don’t really see anything wrong with promoting your entry on social media (as long as you respect your taxpayer-funded budget of course). On the other hand, paying people to bet is clearly deceptive…
I did not read your comment yet when I posted mine, but I couldn’t agree more!!! Great minds think alike!
If u want to WIN Eurovision, you have to do it the authentic way. If u look at the winners of the past 65 years, they were all unique and true to themselves. Maneskin tried to be no one else but themselves, with a genre that rarely does well in Eurovison. Italy always sent very authentic entries from Domenico Modungo to Il Volo always very unique acts! Malta is not really a trendsetter in Eurovision. They are more trend followers, their song this year was clearly very inspired by toy from netta, which won a few years ago, and frankly… Read more »
Not 2011 lol
Well there were some odd winners, but 2011 was the most open year ever! Literally any country could’ve won that year!
This blows my freaking mind. Like If they did this In the Netherlands people would lose their freaking mind over It. Especially with the corona situation In this country, how are the Maltese people reacting ?????
When I wrote about blowing Malteese bubble before contest I got many dislikes and comments… now when the bubble burst in the final (ofc!) and more cringy facts are coming out I wonder where are all those bubble-blowers now? Wiwibloggs? How much did Malta pay you in this process? #shamefull
they didn’t pay wiwibloogs, its only natural to write many posts about the odds favorite (even if they were manipulated) many posts were written about Duncan in 2019 and Netta in 2018. there are many esc blogs if you have such a problem with this one
But wiwibloggs are not obliged to go into the trap. I am a little bit confused by Wiwibloggs sometimes. I would like some more analytical articles about the competition once in a while. It is so interesting and full of stories. But they just go for the superficial. I like the glam and fun but would prefer a little bit more real journalism from time to time.
yes they are not obliged but it’s bound to happen if you are one of the artists receiving the most attention and at the top of the odds people will want to hear about it. articles featuring destiny would get more clicks and traction than say an article about Tornike or Ana Soklic even if its not fair to those artists. I do agree tho, some more articles about the actual competition would be great
it did turn out they paid websites and social media influencers to spam their entry…
Honestly, I could not care less about this monet controversy. Promotion can’t buy victory, unless you’re already a contender to win. Yes, it was annoying to receive ads everywhere but this is not Destiny’s fault. I really did not want Je Me Casse to win, for the future of the contest, I want to stop the Swedish-ization here, even though I enjoy Swedish entry most kf the times, but I am a bit tired of countries who don’t select local talent (Cyprus and Malta, I am looking at you). I feel really sad for Destiny, people really deceived and she… Read more »
In a normal year, a lot of the budget I imagine goes on touring at pre-parties (so Eurovision In Concert, Madrid, London, Latvia, Israel Calling and Moscow). So I guess some of the money funding virtual ads came from that.
Hopefully then it’s just a problem this year.
So what happened during Eurovision week? Is it because there were many genuine bets that Malta fell a bit in the odds?
What is clear is that the jury system needs a change. We’ve seen it multiple times with Malta (remembering Ira Losco and the huge difference between jury and televote) and now Destiny, but it’s not the first time we have a heavily influenced jury, apart from the well-known issue with the exchange of points and the deliberate nul points given to favorites from other favorites (like the French jury)
Ira is great. Been to Malta to her concert. She beats a lot of other local artists definitely, she was rocking! And her latest album is very very decent and if you think about what is Malta then it’s a jewel ?:)
I agree to a certain extent but at the same time, isn’t disparity between juries and televoting desirable? I mean, if jury votes matched televoting, there would be no point in having them. Juries are meant to judge different things than the average viewer does, thus producing a different result, it’s the basic idea of the split voting.
This is not new. Malta followed the exact same strategy than Israel in 2018. The problem is that the song was much worse and it was a much better year musically. The seventh place is well deserved, not because of the song, which is mediocre, but because of Destiny’s performance, which was stellar (Although, in the semi better than in final, I think). She can be proud of herself and now concentrate on how she wants her career to develop.
The amount of sponsored ads for Malta on Twitter was insane last week, it is the worst way of trying to get votes because it turns people off. All things considered, I really feel sorry for Destiny because she didn’t deserve this much on her plate, she just needed a team who could trust her with delivering the song and that’s it, publicity shouldn’t be her thing to deal with. About the running order, I think Malta would have gotten more points if placed later, but not that many points, and we have to consider that the jury vote was… Read more »
You can tell by Destiny’s face in the green room that she was chosen and trained to go there and only win. They built a hype around her, they put adds from Sweden to Greece about it, they built this narrative of female empowerment like Netta, they spent 100.000 for every minute of her perfomance only to score 47 points. I only feel sad about Destiny cause she is a young girl and a victim of a desperate broadcaster. Ira Losco in 2016 had the same hype around her but she was smart enough to realize that the hype was… Read more »
And they’ve lost, nevertheless…
Worse. They are not even in the top5!
I have no issues with promotion or with how public vote. Public is brutal and straight forward about the acts they like or dislike (as we saw this year), but my concern is the juries and I believe Malta (and potentially a few other countries) have been playing this dirty game for a while. Please, remember 2016… I am absolutely sure Malta did some underground action that year with the juries. They won semi and came top 5 in the final. They got 12 pts from Montenegro, I mean, c’mon. I am trying to say it’s s hard to manipulate… Read more »
I think a step in the right direction would be to request from each country 5 new jury members EVERY year, whose identity would be known only to the EBU, until after the final.
Yes, but the key difference is that what I suggest is a complete new set of jury members every year. What happens today is that among those “anonymous” jury members there are so many that are there every year, so it’s simply not anonymous anymore, and the way from there to corruption is short.
I think a good idea would have at least 12 anonymous jury members but only the results of 5 or 6 randomly picked jurors leaving the other votes available for view but not for use on the competition. That why the likelihood of 12 jurors marking a country first/last would decrease and having selected jurors dropped from the end process would banish bribes etc as their vote may not be used.
There is a rule that a jury member can’t come back I think after 3 or 2 years from his last time.
But anyway, many changes are needed to prevent any corruption
Whoever thought this was a good idea was being delisional imo. These things have a way of coming into the clear and in the end it only put more pressure on Destiny and made her feel bad about her 7th place which is actually quite high considering we had 39 participants
Why would you pay to improve your odds? When rehearsal week comes around you see some songs become favourites out of nowhere, if Malta was the winning song they thought it would be then they shouldn’t have worried about the odds, which don’t really mean anything until around this time anyway.
Because the odds affect the juries. That’s why.
Hadn’t it been for the odds, Malta wouldn’t have been 3rd with the juries.
And how exactly? N. Macedonia in 2019 and Austria in 2018 were low in the odds, but still they smashed the jury vote!
Exactly. People, who think juries vote based of the odds, are delusional.
I did not say the jury votes were based on the odds. I said they were AFFECTED by them. There is a big difference.
Yup , what you mean is if there is an odds on favourite I’ll not want to place it 25th even if it’s my least favourite. I’d place my favourites at top but get “affected” by the hype to place this odds favourite 14th instead of 25th .
I’m sorry Robyn, but if Wiwibloggs got money to promote Malta, you all should come clean ASAP.
If you didn’t, please make it clear for us all to see.
I think we, as loyal readers, deserve to know what we support here.
Those attempts of yours to show that Malta is really really really popular in the real not manipulable objective world are not doing you any good.
“local broadcaster PBS invested public money on betting agencies.”
This is so pathetic.
The issue isnt the song, its a pretty good song. Its the fact that Malta aggresively promoted it as a winner, sort of not trusting the audience and voters to decide. Similar to how Netflix aggresively promotes their movies during award season, voters get fed up with it
I never bought the hype. I always said that she was struggling to make a mediocre song sound good. Then all the hype followed to convince people into believing it was a big favourite, when in reality it was just another song in the competition with an average chance. The constant “pushing” by some influencers did not pay off either, because most people have brains and they can also use it. I do pity Destiny because she deserved much better than to be treated in such a way, even though watching her expression on the night was rather shocking. It… Read more »
I think, Bulgaria manipulated with the odds too, otherwise it would have not been a televote flop, it only got points from countries with huge Bulgaria diaspora, like the UK, Spain etc.
I would say Bulgaria’s odds may have been hyped because of how good the last year’s entry was. Growing Up Is Getting Old was not very catchy, hence why it only did well with juries, but I think Tears Getting Sober would achieve a much better result.
plus growing up is getting old also did quite well in the televote in the first semi.. (probably flopped in the final cos of running order and France and Italy getting a lot of points)
Not true because Bulgaria dropped in the odds very quickly before eurovision week.The reason to being high was last year’s entry because the hype was still active
Lesson to learn: You can’t buy your result (the last time it worked was in 2011). Malta failed and so did San Marino which tried a different, less controversial strategy but ultimately with the same idea – if we throw money at it, we will do well (or even win). All you need is authenticity and a good song. That’s “the formula”. I’m getting increasingly annoyed with how betting odds seem to affect juries (although I admit Maltese performance had its qualities – still, I don’t think it would do this well organically) but I guess there is nothing that… Read more »
Agree. And the same could be said about Wiwibloggs. They are part of this scheme too…cause it was obvious that the Maltese previewed to Wiwibloggs their entry and then they ran an article and video all hyping it up. Whether they received money for it, I guess the audit will reveal. I just hope that Wiwibloggs then reports on it fairly. Such a shame for William and the gang but I have been saying this for a long time that bloggers are becoming part of the problem ….
Same opinion, but I doubt they would be honest enough to say: Yes, we received money and how much it was.
i commented on youtube that bloggers and sites were paid to hype up malta and they deleted my comment. that says a lots.
The song was meant to be performed that way. She wasn’t being arrogant, she had confidence and sass.
The issue here is with the Maltese delegation and although legal (I think), it’s pathetic and unfair. It created false hype to the Maltese public and Destiny herself and ultimately were left highly disappointed.
We’re not talking about her performance, just see how James reacted to his televote result and then look at Destiny… I wouldn’t even wanna see how she would react to 0 points jeez
Destiny is not arrogant she was disappointed with her result that is normal
Her face said it all during the results. She was third !! in juries and still her face was sour as a grape. Even though she could still win it at that point.
I guess she knew at that point that she will do better with juries than televoting, given how disasterous the reactions to the staging were. Thus she knew that not doing too well with juries meant she will not win.
But yeah, the way she was sad about finishing third with juries while other enjoyed even being in top 15 says a lot about attitude of the Maltese delegation. Same goes for Switzerland by the way (although I have to admit thar looking at SJB’s facial expressions during the voting made my smile a bit).
Who in the Swiss delegation had a bad attitude then? Gjon and Wouter Hardy were as normal as other participants.
Yes, look at her face when Ukraine received 267 points. It was like “Are you kidding me?”. I think she was told by “her” team that she is the winner…
I’m sorry, but she came across as arrogant and unauthentic. You need to really be biased not to see it. People intuitively sensed it.
oh of course a Black woman with confidence is arrogant. racist
HER RACE HAS NO CONNECTION WITH HER ATTITUDE, please stop using it as an excuse
For a moment I thought you didn’t even deserve a response for this inexcusable, shocking comment. Yet, for the sake of real victims of racism, I must write back. If someone here is a racist, it’s not me. The fact that you see Destiny through the race glasses, and interprets everything accordingly, shows you are the one obsessed with race. Not me. I didn’t even think about her skin color. A black woman, as you defined Destiny, can come across as arrogant, just like any other human being. The fact that you immediately attributes this to racism is a shame,… Read more »
Literally did not even notice that she’s black lol
seriously? give your head a wobble.
Overhyped mediocre song for weeks and weeks #1 in the odds. There was something fishey going on. And was this blog payed by the Maltese for overhyping? (OK, Joke. Or not a joke?) But we are not sure yet. If so, it’s bye bye for Malta. At least one year. Cheating is a no-go.
Yes the Maltese broadcaster showed to Wiwibloggs the demo of Malta ESC 2021 song Wiwibloggs reacted to it.Search on YouTube We preview Malta ESC 2021 song.So yes this blog was also payed by Maltese broadcaster
Releasing a demo to someone doesn’t mean paying them, although I have a bit of an issue with that because very few journalists can retain their impartiality towards someone who gives them preferential access. After all, you don’t want to lose that in future.
I can’t imagine Wiwibloggs getting an early access to a song and then tell it sucks (if it sucked, which was not this case).
Wiwibloggs talked very positive over the demo that create hype
Agreed. If you wanna win, do it like a pro, not like a smuggler.
There need to be some strict EBU rules about manipulation of odds, youtube views, spotify charts. Then there’s also paying bloggers, vloggers, influencers and social media bots which can’t be controlled. The best EBU could do is regulate a budget cap for broadcasters including private donations and sponsorships. If some broadcasters want to limit their stage show for more media promotion that’s their choice. Overall we need more transparency.
I never bought the hype for Je Me Casse (although appreciate it and have liked it on Spotify) and I don’t find anything wrong with a delegation marketing a song. Where this gets dicey for me is if they paid foreigners to place bets to inflate betting odds. Mostly because it creates a sense of false positive and ultimately backfires like it did and poor Destiny becomes delusional she is going to do better than she might. So while the juries can buy into the hype because they are more likely to follow Eurovision news and be a bit more… Read more »
tbf tho this was always going to do well with Jurirs. It’s a radio friendly song, it has power vocals and it’s Malta.
A little Google Translate tells me the EBU made the right decision giving Belarus the boot bc Jesus Christ the way they talk over there on state television is horrific.
I don’t really know Italian, but based on the cognant words, They clearly didn’t like the band.
I tried to send you a translation, but the message is waiting for approval, maybe wait for some hours
That’s OK. I ran through Google translate anyway and yikes. I don’t think Belarus should be coming back next year or for a long time
The viral charts can be manipulated more easily than the most streamed charts. If you share the song on social media where there will be people listening to the song you will create a buzz that is needed. If the song is on people’s lips, it will be shown. The most streamed charts shows what people like while the viral charts show what people talk about.
As a Maltese I feel bad that something like this happened, it gave us high hopes, and more importantly did so to the singer, poor Destiny. Having said that, we did win the semi final and came second with the public. Why did the EBU place us in sixth position? Was that fair? No one is disputing the truthfulness of the allegations, but one has to also see if there is in fact a hidden agenda, like that to bring back MESC. I hope a new system of selecting the song will arise but MESC was a very flawed method… Read more »
I agree that its a flawed way of allocating spots, but the only agenda i see is that someone has to go there and given the mix of the first half, Malta fit there best.
You don’t need running order to win. Malta wouldn’t have won even if it performed in second half next to the end of the show.
Running order had nothing to do with the result of the televote. In the grand final destiny’s performance felt unoriginal – plus the two huge favorites (Italy and France who didn’t partake in the semis) took many votes in the final that went to other countries in the semi.
It still should have been given a better draw… It won its semi.
I have to say, a reason why I haven’t moved away from wiwibloggs all this time is because they seriously listen to us in the comments; we ask for an article about the scandal, they give us the article about the scandal… Well played!
Oh, and I read somewhere that the EBU still tries to confirm the rumour that many votes from the televote were not counted..! Could that mean that James could get at least ONE point because I have been thinking about this embarrassing moment since the grand final…
James won’t get one point as he was almost always bottom 3 with televotes. The only big 5 that did quite well in the televoting without getting to top 10 is Germany.
I’d say the constant pushing has been rather counterproductive and annoying in the end. I started seeing ads ever since the song came out and soon after it was already 1st in the betting odds. Back in march I jokingly said their delegation had something to do with it because they really seemed eager to win….oh well I noticed how the fake hype was working in a way, because she did gain a lot of fans, so I would say at some points the betting odds do influence public opinion – up until the moment they actually see the performances… Read more »
Also Twitter thousands of popup ads about voting destiny.
Also why Ira Losco and Michela were on the Malta’s jury this year when they are both close friends of Destiny ? I thought that a juror must have no connection with any participant to be so.
Ira Losco is the one who has chosen Destiny for the X-factor finals. Michela ranked Switzerland at the last place 25th I just saw on the detail results, oooch…. How professional is this.
Yes and they also gave their 12 points to Albania. Something that couldn’t compromise their win. Destiny couldn’t even point out who she would give her 12p to apart from herself in an interview which she was probably told to say big yikes
Nikkie pushed EVERYONE to give an answer, except: …. Destiny!
(It’s the only LookLab interview I wouldn’t watch again, I like and respect Nikkie a lot)
The investigation will tell if something illegal (or at least shady) happened, but in any case It’s good that their aggressive strategy hasn’t worked, otherwise we could see other countries using the same weapons and we would end up having a dispute between sponsored content and not songs. If they got to the point of manipulating odds, it screams desperation. The irony is that in terms of televote it may actually worked against Malta. After all, when we listen to “the bookies’ favorite” we tend to me more demanding.
Stefania was in her own hands. She and her team were doing her PR.
The Maltese broadcaster took control over destiny. They probably even told her how to respond to questions , etc. They wear shoving things down our throats and we are not even in Malta. Imagine destiny’s situation. She can’t even say all this in public if she wanted to cause Eurovision is her dream and her dream is in TVM’s hand.
Well, this is rather “meta” – Wiwibloggs posting an article about Malta’s abundance of sponsored advertising, which it appeared this blog was doing for some of this season anyhow.
If it was taxpayers’ money spent then of course the investigation should be welcomed. However, I don’t see the problem in getting some private sponsorship or even free promoting where it’s around. It just depends whose money it is.
Up next in breaking news…
Purple Mask accused of liking Eurovision and encouraging friends to watch it!
LOL, that’s old news. I have many times encouraged people to watch Eurovision. Some people are just really set in their ways. 🙂
We can but try 🙂
I think the issue was more on artificially inflating betting odds to create a fall sense of hype using taxpayers’ money.
With that said, as someone who’s not from Europe, the thought of feeling ever so slightly excited by who gambling bookkeepers say may win is just weird.
Makes for a good episode of My Crazy Obsession on TLC in the States.
If blogs are going to write about betting odds regardless, then if a delegation artificially inflates the odds then they will get the headlines they are after without having to do anything more. Russia was said to do similar with odds in 2016.
During the voting of the semi final I was on this site and there was a banner that promted me to vote on Destiny. I wonder how that happend?
In fairness to wiwibloggs—that was probably a programmatic ad. Wiwi likely sells ad space through a vendor and Malta likely bought programmatic ads reaching people who have searched or consumed Eurovision media—so if you get hit with ads for Malta their ad buying works. Wiwi has no control of what ads gets placed on a network that happens to hit you unless they are buying specifically through Wiwi which is doubt they have that infrastructure in place. Simple digital marketing. Ads for Malta voting do not reach people who have no interest in Eurovision.
Yes if that is the case they need to take control of that. It was extremely annoying and it made me stop going here. They loose credibility. I just came back to see if this question would be addressed here. I am glad they did. But still the trust is broken.
It largely depends on the location where you are accessing Wiwibloggs from, which the website doesn’t necessarily have control of what appears there. I live outside Europe so the ads I’m getting are localized based on my IP addresses’ location.
Try clearing out cookies from your browser.
Thanks Robyn. That’s interesting, and is perhaps worth looking at again for the future. It’s probably just the result of our perception of the blog rather than what is actually put into it. Also, there is the separate question of the advertising banner, which Hélène has already pointed out below. Cheers, and have a good off-season. 🙂