Eurovision Song Contest with changes: this is how the vote will be

MALMÖ (Dagbladet): Finland and Iceland are among the countries that will fight on Tuesday evening for a place on to the big Eurovision final on Saturday.

Didn’t show up

Norwegian TV viewers will have to be patient a little longer, as Gåte will not be on stage until Thursday.

This year, the organizer has taken several steps and made several changes to how the voting will be. Eurovision itself has mentioned the new rules on its own pages.

As last year, only telephone votes determine the result in the semi-finals, and as usual, voting does not open until after all the participants have performed on stage. In the final, however, this has changed.

New this year is that the audience can start voting already when the first entry goes on stage in the final. Voting is kept open for 40 minutes after the last country has left the stage. The voting window in the final therefore increases considerably.

Changes have also been made to the voices coming in from the rest of the world. This year, those outside the participating countries have a full 24 hours to cast their votes.

– Comes from the abdomen

That the rest of the world can also vote for their favorites was introduced in Eurovision last year.

Eurovision manager Martin Österdahl has explained to Billboard why they are now making changes. Among other things, he believes that the old voting system was outdated.

– If you see something you like, you can vote immediately. It also fits better with how the young people are today, who are used to being able to participate in the shows immediately from the start.

Another change that is new this year is that the “big five” and host nation Sweden will be allowed to perform. Before, you only got a small taste, but this year they will, like the others, be allowed to perform in the show.

– Trying to put pressure on us

The Big Five consist of France, Italy, Germany, Spain and Great Britain. They are pre-qualified because they pay much more to enter the competition.

This means that they are not dependent on telephone votes for a place further in the competition.

– From time to time we have felt that the big five might have a disadvantage. We have looked at ways to fix it. The pre-qualified have done much better recently, but we still feel that it is high time to make this change now, says Österdahl to Billboard.

This means that eager TV viewers will already see Marcus and Martinus (22) perform on stage on Tuesday, with the Swedish flag on their chests.

– Actually got a little scared

No changes have been made to the distribution between jury votes and public votes in the final, and both still count for 50 percent of the result each.

Many have wanted a change here after Finnish Käärijä had to see himself beaten by Swedish Loreen (40), despite having won the popular vote by a good margin.