Eurovision Song Contest - Voting

Voting

Further information: Voting at the Eurovision Song Contest

The voting systems used in the contest have changed throughout the years. The modern system has been in place since 1975, and is a positional voting system. Countries award a set of points from 1 to 8, then 10 and finally 12 to other songs in the competition — with the favourite song being awarded 12 points.

Historically, a country's set of votes was decided by an internal jury, but in 1997 five countries (Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Sweden and the United Kingdom) experimented with televoting, giving members of the public in those countries the opportunity to vote en-masse for their favourite songs. The experiment was a success, and from 1998 onwards all countries were encouraged to use televoting wherever possible. Back-up juries are still utilised by each country, in the event of a televoting failure. Nowadays members of the public may also vote by SMS, in addition to televoting. But, the current method for ranking entries, first used in 2009, is a 50/50 combination of both telephone vote and the votes of juries made up of music professionals.

The voting is presided over by the EBU scrutineer, who is responsible for ensuring that all points are allocated correctly and in turn. According to one study of Eurovision voting patterns, certain countries tend to form "clusters" or "cliques" by frequently voting in the same way. Yet another study concludes that as of 2006 voting blocs has, on at least two occasions, crucially affected the outcome of the contest.

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