Eurovision 2018: last minute changes in juries voting system
Trying to improve the voting system,EBU is going to change the way the juries vote since this year. A slight change will change the importance of each member’s vote. The aim is the total ranking to count more than the ranking of each judge separately.
Until 2017, the juries’ rating was calculated as follows: The sum of the judges’ ratings came together, and the best-performing song was taken the 12th.Several times, however, a judge’s rank may differ greatly from that of the others, resulting in a disproportionate impact on the overall ranking.
This year’s changeover is as follows: The EBU will give pre-determined points to each position of the rankings, resulting in an increase in the scores of the songs in the top 3. The first song will be 12 and the points will decrease geometrically as we go down . The sum of scores for the 26 songs by the five judges will be the ranking of each country’s jury. The song with the highest score will be 12, the second 10, the third 8 and so on.
In simple terms, the lower a song is classified, the smaller the effect on the overall ranking. The higher, the greater the effect.
Are you confused?
First example: We have Song A and Song B. Four judges classify song A in the first place and one in the twentieth. Song B is ranked second by four and one-third. With the system so far Song B is higher in the overall ranking than Song A. With the new system, however, Song A is higher in the ranking.
Second example: four juries’ members rank Song C sixteenth and one ranks it first. With the system so far it is most likely that it would not get points. With the new system, however, it may get into the top ten and get points.
The graph below explains the new way of voting:
This system aims to the group vote and not the vote of each judge separately. The top 10 has more power, but the songs placed out of top 10 are not totally “lost”.
This change was already decided by the EBU in January. Jon Ola Sand said the songs with the best rank are more recognized and the group overtakes the individual. There will be no other difference in the vote, the score will again come out with a 50/50 jury combination and televoting.
The names of each country’s juries members will be announced on Monday 30 April.
