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Since 2009, the final outcome has been decided by both the viewers and the juries, and now the time has come for everyone to know who is part of the national juries around Europe!
The juries that has 50% of the total power during the voting, both in the semi-finals and in the final, has finally been revealed. Each participating country in the contest, has selected a 5 man jury, and all the names has been revealed by the EBU.
The list is revealed to the public before the actual contest takes place, in order to give viewers and mostly fans across the world, a chance to see who are given half of the power in the final outcome. The reasoning behind this is also due to the wishes of the EBU about being transparent and open to the public.
This decision also comes after there were talks about juries being manipulated by others, to vote for specific countries, which did happen when the juries were re-introduced back to the contest in 2009.
The full list of national jurors can be found by clicking here! (In PDF)
Among the names on the long list, we do find some familiar ones that should ring a bell with Eurovision fans.
To name a few of them:
- Nathan Trent (Represented Austria in 2017)
- Laura Tesoro (Represented Belgium in 2016)
- Tom Dice (Represented Belgium in 2010)
- Emmelie De Forest (Represented Denmark & won in 2013)
- Niamh Kavanagh (Represented Ireland in 2010 & won in 1993)
- Aminata (Represented Latvia in 2015)
- Amber (Represented Malta in 2015)
- Cristina Scarlat (Represented Moldova in 2014)
- Guri Schanke (Represented Norway in 2007)
- Michał Szpak (Represented Poland in 2016)
- Bojana Stamenov (Represented Serbia in 2015)
Change In The Jury Voting!
A few days ago, it was also revealed that some minor changes would be implemented into how the juries would vote this year.
The change in the jury voting will for example see, how a great favorite within the jury group scoring better, even if one jury member should completely disagree, more about the topic can be read here, well explained by one of our editors.
It might be a minor change, but it can still be quite a relevant and game changing change, depending on how each jury member votes.
The televote will remain the same, with the top 10 from each nation being awarded points.
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Strict, But Fair…?
In order for one to be part of the national juries around Europe, a few criteria must be set by each individual person.
To name some of them, we have the following:
- Members of the jury must not have been part of the jury in the previous two years
- Members of the jury must pursue a profession in or related to the music industry
- No member of a jury shall be connected in any way with any of the participating songs entered and/or artists performing in the contest in such a way that they cannot vote in complete independence and impartiality
The votes of each juror must be kept in complete secret and must not be revealed at any time, only by the EBU after the Grand Final has taken place and a winner has been crowned.
In case of any rules being broken, the EBU can decide to either remove a jury member or even completely discard the jury voting of a country.
This is a case we’ve seen multiple times in the past few years, such as in 2016, when a Russian juror decided to stream from the viewing room, which resulted in a replacement, and in 2015, when both the juries of FYR Macedonia & Montenegro were completely discarded and so only the televote results from the two countries counted.
What do #YOU think of the juries that were announced? Share your thoughts with us on our forum HERE and in the comments section below!
