Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Eurovision

Broadcaster in the infobox song contest national year

Hi. I don't know if this has ever been discussed before, but I'm wondering why the participating broadcaster is not in the Infobox song contest national year, when it is actually the one entering the contest. Ferclopedio (talk) 08:39, 18 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, why is it not? — IмSтevan ^talk 08:40, 18 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's a really good question, it really should include that. Aris Odi ❯❯❯ talk 11:20, 18 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I hadn't considered this. I support changing the infobox to include this. Ktkvtsh (talk) 16:08, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

OK. Is four enough quorum? Anyway, I'm going to request the change on the talk page of the template. Let's see if some kind soul will listen to us. Ferclopedio (talk) 19:54, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose this. The infobox is not a in depth view of the participation's entire background for the year and in most cases, the broadcaster is a stable and the same each year. I'm not sure what adding this "adds" for the reader. Grk1011 (talk) 20:57, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The contest is a competition between broadcasters, adding the participating broadcaster is not a vision of depth but is one of the fundamental data of the article, which should also appear prominently in the lead section. Of course there are broadcasters that have been stable over the years, but there are cases where they have not been, such as in France, Belgium, Germany, and Russia, to give just a couple of examples of the seventeen that I have counted. Ferclopedio (talk) 21:21, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The lead section is the prose, where this information is always presented prominently. The regular country in articles have the broadcaster in the infobox because those articles are about that country (and broadcaster's) overall participation efforts. The impact is not the same for the country in year articles where the broadcaster is certainly relevant information, but it is not particularly interesting to the reader and has no bearing on the quick-reference nature of an infobox. Grk1011 (talk) 13:07, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Does it not? To me it feels like the broadcaster is even more relevant than the country — IмSтevan ^talk 13:13, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It comes down to the audience of the article and the impact. It is through the national broadcaster (a government entity) that the country is represented, otherwise articles, press, viewers, etc. would be saying things like "BBC in the Eurovision Song Contest"; however, these articles are about the countries. The broadcaster is an important part of how the participation occurs, but it does not need to be that prominent for the quick-reference nature of the infobox. Do we have any sense of why the viewer would need to know the specific broadcaster as they scan the page for the results, which is the point of the infobox on these pages? The information is still in the body of the articles. To be blunt, I cannot figure out why someone would care what the broadcaster was at the high level overview. Grk1011 (talk) 13:40, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Why would the viewer need to know who composed the song since that's also featured in the infobox? Because it's relevant to the entry, and so is the competing broadcaster — IмSтevan ^talk 13:48, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I completely disagree with that comparison. Grk1011 (talk) 13:51, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Grk1011, I am sorry, but your reasoning is based on assumptions and general beliefs that are not true, rather than on actual facts.

The EBU is an organisation of broadcasting companies with their own independent legal entity. The fact that they are publicly funded or state-owned does not make them a government entity. In fact, the EBU would not allow a government entity to be a member, as it requires a certain level of impartiality and independence for membership (a level that the Russian and Belarusian broadcasters do not meet, which is why they were expelled).

The participating broadcaster enters the competition representing its country, meaning that it competes under the name of its country, for better identification in the international competition, and to give local viewers the feeling that the participation is theirs and not just that of the broadcaster. This does not mean that the country is the one that competes, and statements like "the broadcaster organizes the country's participation", "the broadcaster participates on behalf of the country", "the broadcaster selects the country's entry", and the like, which are all over Wikipedia, are all wrong. The broadcaster participates in the contest in its own right, and has full control over its participation. It is not just an important part of how the participation occurs, it is who really participate and who pay to do so.

The ESC is a television co-production (legal, financial, and technical) of the participating broadcasters, who elect the members of the committee that governs the event on behalf of all of them. The participating broadcaster is not only "responsible for choosing a song and broadcasting the event" (another wrong statement all around Wikipedia). The participating broadcaster is the one invited by the EBU to participate; the one who decides whether to participate or not; the one who pays the participation fee to finance the event; the one who selects a song freely at his discretion, organizing or not a national final that it can take into account or not; the one who secures the rights of the song from the songwriters; the one who hires the performer (and the conductor when there was an orchestra) for the live performance; the one who has to provide the EBU with all the legal and audiovisual documentation of its entry, including contracts, lyrics, the video-clip (in most cases produced by itself), music track (or sheet music for the orchestra), and the camerawork layout for the live broadcasting; the one who decides on the staging of the live performance; the one who appoints a head of delegation as its contact with the EBU, and the one responsible for its delegation at the event; the one who assembles the "national" jury for the competition (even when there was only televoting, since the jury was the backup); the one who hires the notary public to certify its jury's vote; the one who owns the broadcasting rights and the brand exploitation rights in the country (exclusively or shared with the other EBU members in the same country); the one who produces the broadcast for his local viewers with its own commentators and onscreen information; the one who produces and transmits the voting segment of its spokesperson for the international broadcast; the one who bears expenses of all this; the one who has to host the contest the following year in case of winning; and the one who takes all the criticism if the participation was not successful. (And I've probably left out some other things). The participating broadcaster is not only a fundamental data for an entrant but also for the event itself.

The country in year articles are the most in-depth articles of this project with the most detailed information on a participation, and it is the place where it makes the most sense to have the information of the participating broadcaster, as it is an indispensable element of the participation, since it has the power over the song and the performer. @ImStevan's feeling that the participating broadcaster is even more relevant than the country is correct, I would say that it is the most important piece of information of the participation. And you only have to look at country in year articles from old years to see that in many cases, it's not just that it's not in the lead section, it's that it's not even mentioned anywhere in the prose or it's mentioned as something totally secondary. There are even articles that have passed the GA review that talk about a wrong participating broadcaster.

The use in Wikipedia of the name of the country when speaking in general and in the country and country in year articles is also for better identification of the participant internationally, matching the way it is presented in the contest, and to group all the entrants that come from the same country in the same place and in the same way. In no way does it mean that it is the country that participates. And indeed, the local press throughout Europe talks extensively about the participation of the broadcaster in the contest ("BBC at the Eurovision Song Contest", for example).

All this is not just me saying it, it is said by the EBU and the participating broadcasters in all their official documentation and communications, starting with the rules of the competition, an extract of which can be read here.

And this has nothing to do with the audience of the article and the impact, this is not a blog, this is an encyclopedia, and it has to do with the presentation of the information and facts correctly, preferably in order of importance. And the participating broadcaster is, indeed, the foremost piece of information of an entry, whether you are interested in knowing it or not. Ferclopedio (talk) 22:18, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that the user seems to have forgotten that it's not a country entering, but "EBU member broadcaster from country" — IмSтevan ^talk 07:50, 27 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm still not convinced it makes sense. I don't recall seeing examples from reliable sources that place the broadcaster ahead of the country name for identification purposes. Let's remember that the infobox is for quick-reference information; it is not intended to be an exhaustive list nor even a full summary of the article. Grk1011 (talk) 00:48, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How do you explain the discrepancy between articles that overview a country's entire history at the contest (where the current broadcaster is prominently listed) and by year articles (where it is not) — IмSтevan ^talk 02:59, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The country in articles are focused on the performance of a country overall throughout the years, for which the broadcaster is paramount as the organizing body. For country in year articles, the focus is on the entry itself (i.e. selection, song, artist, and performance), where those aspects are critical details and are therefore in the infobox. It's not a "discrepancy" as these are different types of articles. If we include every detail in every article, then we lose the whole point of detailed sub articles. Grk1011 (talk) 13:09, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In this case the sub article is missing the detail, what now — IмSтevan ^talk 14:21, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Grk1011, I honestly don't understand how you see the role of the participating broadcaster paramount in the country but not in the country in year. The participating broadcaster is the actual entrant in the contest, as is the one invited by the EBU to participate that year and the one who has to fulfill all the obligations for it. In order to compete it selects the song, hire the artist/performer, and stage the performance. The participation is its and its alone as it has full control over it.

We are not including every detail in the infobox. We want to include only the essential information: the entrant (the participating broadcaster), the name of the country under which it participates, the entry (song + songwriters), the artist/performer, the selection method, and the result. I don't think we are asking for anything unreasonable.

And this points out one thing that is wrong in the infobox, as the artist/performer is called the "entrant", something that is completely incorrect as this is a song contest between broadcasters, not a singer contest, so the artist cannot be the entrant in any way. Ferclopedio (talk) 18:38, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm warming to the broadcaster in the infobox (as it's abbreviation/acronym). I'm not sure I understand this new entrant comment now though? Grk1011 (talk) 13:08, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well the entry into the contest is the song, not the performer. I imagine just a renaming of the value from "entrant" to "performer", as is the case in the tables — IмSтevan ^talk 13:18, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that is the point. The entrant is the broadcaster and the entry is the song, so we should rename in the infobox the parameter "entrant" to "performer", or to "artist". (I say "artist", even though I don't like it, because that is what is used in the "Preselection" field when the song and performer are selected separately). I don't think we can change the parameter directly without causing a mess, but at least we can change the label displayed to "Selected performer" (or artist).

And regarding the participating broadcaster in the infobox, I think it's better to show it with its full name followed by its abbreviation in parentheses, to match the way it's shown in the country infobox, and to avoid confusion as for example in the case of RTP, which the same abbreviation is used by "Rádio e Televisão de Portugal" and its predecessor "Radiotelevisão Portuguesa". Ferclopedio (talk) 19:16, 5 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I support this change. It's important for countries which have changed broadcaster in the past (France, Israel, Netherlands), and especially important for countries that swap broadcaster on a regular basis (Belgium, Germany, Russia) Spleennn (talk) 21:34, 2 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Your attention, please. I am pleased to announce that the participating broadcaster is now available in the Infobox song contest national year, by filling in the parameter "broadcaster". Thank to your support and the merge made by BrandonXLF.

Please, make sure that the full name of the broadcaster is correct for the year and country when filling it in, with the correct spelling, and that it matches the one that appears in the prose, in the country article, in that year's contest article, and in the list of countries article, so that we have consistency throughout.

I encourage everyone to take the opportunity to review the prose of the article when filling in the parameter, and to complete the lead section in cases where information is missing. I have already done for Spain and 20th-century Portugal in the ESC, and I have unified their introduction with something like this:

Spain was represented at the [[Eurovision Song Contest XXX]] with the song "[[XXX]]", composed by [[XXX]], with lyrics by [[XXX]], and performed by [[XXX]]. The Spanish participating broadcaster {{lang|xx|[[XXXX]]|i=no}} (XX) selected its entry through ...

Ferclopedio (talk) 17:03, 24 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the update. I think we need a better wording for the intro though that avoids that run-on sentence. Suggest:

Spain was represented at the [[Eurovision Song Contest XXX]] with the song "[[XXX]]", performed by [[X]]. The song, composed by [[XXX]], with lyrics by [[XXX]], was selected through... The event saw ## contestants compete..."

Grk1011 (talk) 18:58, 24 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that is another discussion, the wording I used is improvable. I didn't make it up, I copied it from the best written articles of this kind out there (not written by me).

What I made on purpose was to use the straightforward sentence: "The broadcaster selected its entry" avoiding the use of the "was selected", as the participating broadcaster, as the entrant, is who selected the entry, and its role has to be highlighted as soon as possible in the prose. Ferclopedio (talk) 19:27, 24 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I know I'm probably a bit late to the game on this one. Just back from a Wiki-break and I noticed this change. I'm pretty content with the discussion above, and happy to support the change to add the broadcaster to the infobox. However I do feel it's a bit strange to place the broadcaster above the country in the order of the infobox. In almost every context it is the country that is shown to be participating in the contest, not the broadcaster; i.e. it's the UK entry, not the BBC entry. Graphics, reporting, even the official list of participating broadcasters list the country above the broadcaster. Yes it may be a competition of public service broadcasters, but I still believe that within these infoboxes the country should still take precedence over the broadcaster. Sims2aholic8 (talk) 18:48, 24 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Sims2aholic8, welcome back.

I'm sorry, but in the "official list of participating broadcasters" page you linked, I don't see that "the country is shown to be participating in the contest" or that it "list the country above the broadcaster". I see a page that is titled "37 broadcasters head to Malmö". I see a prose that begins with "Public broadcasters from 37 countries will take part in the Eurovision...". I see a list titled "Participating broadcasters" that lists them alphabetically by country of origin. And I see also the sentence "A total of 35 broadcasters will return from Liverpool 2023". On that page it is clearly stated that the entrant in the contest is a broadcaster, as it is clearly stated in every formal document and in every formal communication, beginning with the rules of the event.

As I said above, the use of the name of the country and the flag, for better identification of the entrant in the international competition, however widespread it may be, does not really make the country a participant, specifically speaking. ("A lie repeated a thousand times does not become the truth"). It is okay to use the name of the country when speaking in general, but when speaking specifically about the entrant we should always make it clear who is participating in the contest, avoiding unnecessary ambiguity and inaccurate statements. The entrant/participant in the contest is a broadcaster who is a "EBU member", who is "from a country", who "participates representing its country", and who "selects its entry". Statements like "the broadcaster organizes the country's participation", "the broadcaster participates on behalf of the country", "the broadcaster selects the country's entry", "the broadcaster is responsible for choosing a song" (as if the country had delegated responsibility on it), and the like, are wrong for all the reasons I said above, and we should avoid them. Just because some of these claims have passed a GA review doesn't make them correct, as the reviewers may not have been aware of everything said and have only looked at grammar, style, reliability of references, etc.

The country in year articles are the most in-depth articles of this project, and it is the place where it makes the most sense to be accurate with the entrant. In this context, giving precedence to the country over the broadcaster in the infobox only serves to continue giving the false impression that it is the country that is participating rather than the broadcaster, and gives the latter a secondary role. Ferclopedio (talk) 07:48, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I understand your viewpoint, but I think it really falls down when you actually consider the bigger picture with participants in Eurovision. Yes it may be a contest in which public service broadcasters send entries, but there is only one entry allowed per country, and only one broadcaster from a given country may participate; therefore the country is just as relevant to the participation as the broadcaster, because it's not just the BBC entry for Eurovision, it's the UK's, because the BBC participating prevents ITV or Channel 4, which are also UK EBU members, from participating.

Additionally, while the 2024 participants release listed it as broadcasters, most likely to downplay the significance of an Israeli entry given the ongoing controversy around that, in all other years it was the countries that received the top billing (albeit with the caveat occasionally that public broadcasters were the ones actually entering the contest; see 2023, 2022, 2021, 2019).

I really disagree with your assertion that we would be somehow "lying" by listing the country ahead of the broadcaster in these infoboxes; I think they are just as important as the other. Broadcasters can only join the EBU if the countries they broadcast from are within the European Broadcasting Area, or are member states of the Council of Europe, therefore I believe the geography is just as important to a broadcaster participating as any other aspect. All the infographics at each contest, not to mention the official Eurovision website on contest history, go by country more than broadcaster. If we also look at other events where "countries" compete and see what Wikipedia does there, e.g. the Olympics, where an athlete can only compete with the backing of the respective NOC, is listed the country first and then the NOC (see Austria at the 2024 Summer Olympics as an example). With all this in mind I just think it's sorta counter-intuitive to keep the country below the broadcaster; as if you're almost trying to bend-over-backwards to make a point that it's a contest where broadcasters compete (just my opinion).

Two other points: I really don't understand why the country name was taken out of the infobox title; surely this should match the article title? And regardless of where the broadcaster is place, I think it looks super weird to keep the flag against the "second" entry within the infobox, and right now this could potentially be a MOS:DECOR violation. I think the flag should either be more prominent, e.g. included in the infobox header, or it should be gotten rid of completely from these infoboxes. Sims2aholic8 (talk) 10:26, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Your viewpoint falls down when you realise that the ESC is a television co-production of the participating broadcasters, who themselves co-produce the event in which they participate. Only one entry is allowed per country, and only one broadcaster from a given country may participate, just to ensure fairness in the competition with the broadcasters from other countries. The point is not that two broadcasters are from the same country, is that they both share the broadcasting area and viewers, and allowing both to participate would unbalance the competition and make it difficult to identify them internationally. Your UK example only reinforces the fact that an entry is just a BBC entry, as the other UK EBU members have no say in the matter.

The country is not as important to participation as the broadcaster, for the simple fact that without a broadcaster there is no participation. A country is not an entity that can participate on its own, nor does it have any right to do so. I am not trying to bend-over-anything, the ESC is a own owned competition between the broadcasters, something that the Olyimics are not. Yes, geography is important to join the EBU, but only in terms of broadcasting area, broadcasting license, broadcasting rights, coverage, public service, laws, etc., that fall within each country; geography gives the country nothing to say in the participation. And again, using the country name to identify the participant speaking in general is fine, even to bring together all the entries that have come from the same country on the official page, but this does not make the country a participant, nor does it diminish the primary importance of the broadcaster.

In the examples of previous years you linked, I still see that the articles start with the sentence in bold: "Public broadcasters from XX countries will take part in the Eurovision.."; and I see sentences like "Fans of the Contest will welcome back ARMTV from Armenia and RTCG from Montenegro" in 2022 or "After the cancellation of the ESC2020 nearly half of the broadcasters already confirmed their participants for 2021.", which makes your Israeli theory collapse. In addition, if you check the official performance videos of recent years, you will see the participating broadcaster billed at the end of the video, and If you go back much further in time you will even see the broadcaster logo in the voting sequence of its spokesperson, just to give a couple of easily visible examples.

My assertion about "lying" had more to do with ignoring or underestimating the role of the broadcaster because the belief that the participant is the country is so widespread.

Regarding the last two points about the infobox, I don't have the slightest idea. Ferclopedio (talk) 16:13, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

If all you say is true, then why are you not pushing for us to rename the articles entirely to remove the country names and list the broadcasters in their place? If you believe that the broadcasters are the most important thing here, then why is it not "BBC in Eurovision" or "SVT in Eurovision"? Also, with this in mind, should we then be splitting the history of each participating country based on the broadcaster? Belgium has two broadcasters that split responsibility for competing in the contest, should we have a "VRT in Eurovision" and a "RTBF in Eurovision" article then? Obviously these suggestions are ridiculous, because by all known criteria of the average viewer and the average reader of Wikipedia, it's the country that matters, not the broadcaster. I absolutely believe that we should be informing people with our articles, but not at the sake of doing things illogically just to make a point. I do believe that the broadcaster is an important part of each country's participation, and has a place within the infoboxes, but placing them ahead of the country just doesn't make logical sense to me, given the article titles reference the country and not the broadcaster, and the official website even reference the country more in the list of participants and the results tables of each edition. Sims2aholic8 (talk) 16:29, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't see anything wrong with the way we used to list and refer to the participants as it aligned very well with the convention seen in reliable sources. While I finally caved to agreeing to giving more prominence to the broadcaster's role (which let me be clear, is set by the media and contest producers, not Wikipedia editors), I would agree with Sims2aholic8 in that rewriting articles in Ferclopedio's way is misleading, and I feel it does not reflect reality. To continue down this path with further "broadcaster is first" changes would be original research. There are certainly articles that talk about how the broadcaster is running its process, but it's the country itself that supports that effort as it's the body that created and funds the broadcaster. It is not our role to 'correct' how sources (including the contest itself) refer to things. If we take a step back, it's important to remember that this contest is an exhibition of national pride and artistic abilities; it's not merely a television show to see which channel can produce the best programming. Even if we can't see eye-to-eye on this, I believe Sims2aholic8's request was just to swap the order of country and broadcaster in the infobox, not to omit broadcaster. I find that to be a very reasonable suggestion that better aligns with how the public actually view this event. Grk1011 (talk) 17:00, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, of course everything I say is true, I wouldn't be here arguing if it weren't. Have you ever read the contest rules?

And for the third or fourth time I say this, I think it's fine to talk about the country when we talk in general terms, or to group all the entries from the same country in the same place (the country articles). At no time have I said that this should change, it would be overkill.

What I'm trying to push is to refer accurately to who the participant is when talking specifically about the entrant (the participating broadcaster), and to avoid statements like "the broadcaster is an important part of each country's participation", that suggests that the country is an entity that participates (I would get into a loop if I started refuting that same sentence again, I have already given sufficient reasons against it above). Ferclopedio (talk) 18:31, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Eurovizija.LT

Should we create the Eurovizija.LT page instead of it being a redirect to Lithuania in Eurovision 2024? Ktkvtsh (talk) 17:47, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For now it only had one edition so let's keep it together — IмSтevan ^talk 18:26, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Typically, a national selection event only gets its own yearly page if the event has a greater meaning/use than just a Eurovision selection process. If it doesn't, it just ends up splitting and/or duplicating information across two pages. Grk1011 (talk) 12:56, 12 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Draft for ESC250

While reveiwing AFC article submissions, I came across Draft:The Eurovision Top 250 Chart. Think some folks should take a look. Ktkvtsh (talk) 22:58, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I think that we should have an article listing various Eurovision related items, under a name "List of Eurovision Song Contest adjacent events", such as ESC250, the Barbara Dex award, Marcel Bezençon awards etc, and that ESC250 alone does not meet the notability criteria. — IмSтevan ^talk 23:17, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Non-English language Taskforce

Eurovision 2024 Pages which need expanding

To all the people looking to help the Eurovision landscape, here are a list of Eurovision 2024 Pages which need expanding. Listed here:

🍗TheNuggeteer🍗 08:10, 11 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

And also, cross out the pages which are post-1000 words. 🍗TheNuggeteer🍗 08:10, 11 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]