Kerflooey The EuroWhat? Podcast The EuroWhat? Podcast Mike 0:01 like, cool, I'm not a ghost. Good to know. Hello, and welcome to the Eurowhat, episode 285, dropping on December 16th, 2025. We are a pair of Americans trying to make sense of the Eurovision Song Contest. I'm Mike McComb, and I'm here with my co-host, Ben Smith. Hey, Ben. Ben 0:27 Hey, Mike. Mike 0:28 In this episode, we'll be coming to terms with the fallout from the Eurovision General Assembly meeting. Oh, goodness. This has been a very busy couple of weeks since our last episode, hasn't it? Ben 0:40 uh, now more than ever, we are trying to make sense. Mike 0:43 there's been a lot. we were originally planning this episode the way we normally plan our news episodes. We're just like, oh, this country's doing this part in their selection. Oh, all of these entries are released, and then the vote happened, and all of the other stuff after that happened. that's kind of going to be the structure that we have for this episode, talking about what happened, what is happening, and then what is going to be with Eurovision stuff for ------ What Happened at the EBU General Assembly Meeting ------ 1:11 Mike 1:11 2026. Ben 1:13 let's talk about what happened. Let's talk about how we got to today. Mike 1:15 Yes, so, the General Assembly for the Eurovision Broadcasting Union had their annual meeting on December 4th and 5th. Uh, one of the main topics that they were going to tackle are, uh, new rules for the Eurovision Song Contest. They announced what the new rule proposal was going to be a couple of weeks ahead of the meeting. uh, first one that they proposed is clearer rules on promotion. so participating broadcasters and artists are not permitted to actively engage in, facilitate, or contribute to promotional campaigns by third that could influence the voting outcome. Um, and, as outlined in the updated Code of Conduct, any attempts to unduly influence the results will lead to sanctions. Ben 2:03 the thing that jumped out to me there in that wording is participating broadcasters and artists, because I feel like the places where we have seen promotional campaigns coming from have not been from the broadcasters of the artists. It's been, uh, essentially, like, the equivalent of a, of a PAC, of a PAC. But, I mean, if the artists can't contribute, then, okay, cool. So, like, you can't shoot video that, that you just sort of send out in a media kit to everybody, and who knows what'll happen with it? Mike 2:25 I guess I'm just curious how this one is going to be enforced, and, how, how to draw the connection between unduly influence the results and... Ben 2:35 Mm-hmm. Mike 2:35 How, how, how are you going to measure the media impact of something, you know? Especially, like, ahead of the contest? Like, it, it really does seem like something that is an after-the-fact decision. Ben 2:46 I get what they're going for, but, like, I feel like this doesn't have the teeth that they think it does. Mike 2:50 Yeah. Uh, next one is fewer maximum votes. So, previously, a, uh, person would have, 20 votes to distribute, and that is per payment method. now they have reduced that number to 10 votes, but it's still per payment method. So, if you have 10 credit cards, you still have 100 votes. the rule statement, uh, quote, fans will be actively encouraged to share their support across multiple entries. What? Ben 3:18 Okay. Cool. What about the fans that aren't really fans that are just sort of showing up to vote for one thing 10 times because they saw a promotional campaign encouraging them to? Mike 3:26 Mm-hmm. Ben 3:27 what if instead of actively encouraged, we change that to actively required? Mike 3:32 Yeah, because, I mean, they do that with junior Eurovision, where, you have to vote for three countries. Like, you have, you have no choice in the matter. If you want to vote for anything, you have to vote for three things. So, I don't know if it would be, like, if you have 10 votes and you have to distribute 10 votes to 10 countries, also, just reducing the number of votes, that means each individual vote carries significantly more weight. I understand the idea behind this, but again, there just seems to be a lot of wishful thinking attached to it. Ben 4:03 Yeah, there's a lot of, well, everybody's going to behave. Mike 4:06 Mm-hmm, Ben 4:07 But, like, we know from the last couple years that, no, no, people are not going to behave. That Mike 4:12 yeah. Ben 4:12 is part of why we're here. It's hard, that's part of why you guys are having a general meeting about the new rules. Mike 4:16 Mm-hmm, yeah, remains to be seen, uh, how this one will pan out. But that is going to be, in conjunction with, the juries coming back to the semifinals. from the release, quote, This change is intended to encourage the optimum musical balance and diversity in songs that qualify for the grand final, ensuring that high-quality entries with broad artistic merit are recognized alongside those with popular appeal. the jury size increasing from five members to seven members per country. At least two jurors must be age 18 to 25. jurors must sign a formal declaration that they will vote independently and impartially. I'm glad that the juries are coming back. I don't love the framing that artistic merit and popular appeal are inversely proportional. Ben 5:08 Yeah, that's very rude to the things that have both popular appeal and broad artistic merit. You can do both of those things Mike 5:14 Yeah, Ben 5:14 at the same time. Mike 5:15 yeah, and, like, they should be rewarded accordingly. Ben 5:19 you're doing both of those things, yes, correct, great! Mike 5:22 increasing the jury size, I think that's an interesting change. the two jurors must be age 18 to 25. It's like, mm, okay, sure. I, I, I don't know what they're going with, Ben 5:32 that. Mike 5:32 with, Ben 5:32 Yeah, Mike 5:32 with Ben 5:33 like, was that a problem before? this feels like they are trying to shore up some of the issues from the last couple years by, okay, cool, we're bringing the jury back that's going to and we are going to make sure that there, you know, that there's better representation so that there, you know, we have younger jury members in the mix. Uh, I'm hopeful that this doesn't become basically the only stronghold against another 2025 situation. Mike 5:54 even with the juries back in there, like, a strong enough televote will still get you into the final. And, yeah, I, I, I haven't had the opportunity to do the true, like, numeric analysis of this, partly because I don't really know how to do the analysis of that, but, I'm just thinking of, like, bac in 2022. Like, Azerbaijan got in solely on the strength of its jury vote because it got zero in the televote, and the opposite could happen as well. and, of course, what happened in 2021 with Croatia where it finished top 10 in both jury and televote and did not get through. So, uh, math is fun, I think, is the point of that story. Ben 6:31 Yeah, it's just like, yeah, stuff like that. Mike 6:34 they are also expanding technical safeguards to identify and mitigate suspicious patterns in the audience vote and prevent fraudulent activity. I mean, that always has been in place, and I don't really know the mechanics of, like, how they do that. Not, not just they, like, Eurovision, but they, like, Ernst and Young and all of the accountants, whoever does the vote validation process. that, that feels like that's always a moving target, and that's just always going to be the case of, like, yep, we just got to keep expanding those safeguards, Ben 7:02 from my end, of course, like, I see something like this, and I'm like, no, go on, what do you mean? How, how, how, Like, how do we identify these things? But, of course, if we talk about how we identify these things, then the people who do the fraudulent votes think of new ways to do this. This is very much a, if you build a better mousetrap, the world builds a better mouse. Mike 7:17 Yes, in the announcement of, uh, voting proposal, which was fully endorsed by the, uh, reference group for Eurovision, quote, Well, Ben 7:42 so, Mike 7:43 what, what that means is the Assembly would be voting on this rules package. If the package passes, then they don't need to do the vote on participation. If the package doesn't pass, then they will have the vote on participation, which may or may not pass. So, that's interesting procedure, since it's of two independent questions that are being asked here. Ben 8:09 even if you're just voting on the rules, you're not voting on the participation by making it so that the participation vote only happens in the event of the rules vote not passing, you are essentially making the rules vote a vote on the participation. Mike 8:21 and also setting up a scenario where you could have, like, the vote on the new rules not passing, and the vote on participation also not passing, which would be the same as not having that. So it's like, cool, no change happening at all. So, yeah, from a procedural standpoint, a little murky. the vote happened, the rules package passed, and so they did not vote on whether or KAN will be participating. And KAN confirmed that they will be in Vienna in 2026. And this was immediately followed by other countries saying whether or not they will be in Vienna. Ben, do you want to take it from here? Ben 8:59 Yeah, let's, let's talk about who smashed the ejector button. coming into this, we had a number of nations who had said if KAN is participating, we are not going to participate. And basically, uh, one happened and then we just sort of got a, a waterfall of press releases from various nations, first, led by the Netherlands, one of the first voices we had heard on this. they are, they are out. They are an OG Eurovision participant. Uh, they've missed out twice due to holiday conflicts. They've missed twice due to relegation. But otherwise, they have 65 appearances. That's a lot. Mike 9:30 Yeah. And actually, when the news broke, like, I found out that Netherlands was out before I saw the results of the rules vote. And, and I had also missed the piece of the, uh, rules vote determining whether or not there would be a participation vote. that, that was a little bit confusing to be like, oh, wow, things really went south. And it's like, oh no, there was just the one vote that happened. But that was enough for Netherlands to say, see ya. Ben 9:55 the one that feels biggest to me and the one I am most interested how this continues to play out is Spain is also out. They are another one. And they are particularly a member of the big five, uh, said that if, if KAN was in, they would not be in. And they are, have also issued a press release. We're not doing Eurovision. This is their first time after 64 appearances where they are not doing Eurovision. Ireland, another one who had said beforehand, if, if KAN is in, we're out. Ireland is out. This is their third time not competing since their debut in 1965. Uh, the only times they have not been in the contest. There was a broadcaster strike in 1983. They were relegated in 2002. notably they are tied with Sweden for the most wins at the contest. They have done this a lot. Mike 10:37 I, Ireland really seems like a big deal. I mean, all of these are like, I feel a big deal, but, uh, I mean, Ireland has been vocal about this uh, 2024. Ben 10:48 like, it does not surprise me that Ireland is doing this, just like, especially in the last year, just seeing, uh, just generally, just over the summer, things with groups like kneecap. like, Ireland has a very strong national opinion about what is happening right now. So it makes sense that if KAN is here, they're not. Mike 11:02 Yes. Ben 11:03 Uh, Slovenia was one of the other nations that leading up to this was really pushing for both this and a lot of the stuff we saw the, these rules measures about. Because KN is there, Slovenia is out. Uh, they are one of the newer members in terms of who is pulling out here. Uh, they debuted in the contest in 1993 and have only missed twice due to relegation in 1994 and 2000. Iceland, uh, had come out of that meeting, said that they were going to go back to Ruv and meet as a council and decide from there, As of December 10th, they have announced they are they debuted in 1986. They've been covering the contest for a while. They generally have like, literally like 99% of the country watching the contest. Like they are big Eurovision fans. Mike 11:40 Mm. Ben 11:40 Uh, they have only missed twice due to relegation in 1998 and 2002. from a broadcasting perspective, this is the first time the contest will not be aired. Like for a lot of these, it's not just, we are not participating. It's, we're not airing the contest. Uh, this is the first time the contest will not be aired in Spain since 1961, uh, in Ireland since 1963, and in Slovenia since 1985. another broadcaster, a pair of broadcasters in the Netherlands have stepped up to air it for the Dutch populace that wants to watch instead of, of Otros. Uh, Ruv has not really commented one way or another, and if they're even going to be broadcasting it, I think they're trying to figure out what are we doing, because, like, they've also said, we're not sure there's going to be Song of Kepnen. Mike 12:20 and I mean, I think that's the thing that's so interesting about all of the countries that have, announced their withdrawal, as a result of this vote, where it's just like, yeah, these are not just, like, brand new countries, or, like, people with short tenures, like, these are long-term, active participants in the contest that take the contest very seriously, it's a shame that they will not be, well, no, it's not a shame that they won't be part of the contest. Ben 12:44 like, Mike 12:44 No, Ben 12:44 no, like, I fully support that. It's like, I had briefly had a, like, an inkling in my head that, okay, like, the two ways that Iceland goes on this is either they pull out, which, like, yes, do that. Yeah, and, alternately, if a song for Bashar Murad, or just, like, can you do another Hatari-level sort of deal? But, like, like, Hatari did that, and, like, I've watched, I've seen their documentary, and, like, we saw the way that that was both effective and ineffective. So, I, I fully support them kind of stepping back this time around. Mike 13:11 yeah, yeah. So, following all of this, Martin Green, CBE, uh, sent a press release to broadcasters and another open letter to fans. Ben is giggling because I included the CBE. We, we've been posting, Ben 13:26 See about it. Mike 13:27 well, yeah, at the same time, uh, I was posting something, I think it was with the second, open letter, Hit the Eurovision website, and I initially put OBE, and it's, like, oh, wait, I should probably double-check that. There is a Martin Green OBE, who, like, works in, like, senior care and, like, seems like a really interesting guy. And I hope he's not, like, super confused as to why there may suddenly be, like, all of this misdirected vitriol in his inbox because of the same sort of error that I made. But, uh, yeah, so I, I'm assuming that he includes the CBE, just to be, am legally distinct from this other person who technically outranks him. Ben 14:07 I used to have a roommate who who was a lawyer and was very fussy about having, like, the, the Esquire afterwards. Mike 14:11 Oh, no, okay. Ben 14:12 Uh, and, like, yeah, no, like, one time I specifically had a friend, uh, mail me a package sent to Ben Smith, comma, GQ. Mike 14:18 anyway, uh, back to the press release. Ben 14:20 Yes, Mike 14:20 Um. Ben 14:20 anyways, back to, yeah. Mike 14:21 had a press release following this vote, and, uh, that included the debate on the Eurovision Song Contest, was respectful and articulate. Uh, members expressing their opinions were reflecting their own and their audience views on this difficult issue. Not those of any political perspective or political party. U, yeah, there was just a lot of information coming out of this meeting, which was not a meeting open to the public. it's not like there were transcripts available. There isn't, like, EBU-C-SPAN that was covering this. a fertile ground for misinformation. there was an open letter, uh, that was also released to fans, uh, because Martin loves an open letter. and it included, see, quote, I also know you feel strongly about events in the Middle East and how those realities connect to the Eurovision Song Contest. No one can fail to be moved by what we have seen in the region in the past few years. Some of you have written to us, spoken out, or expressed anger and pain at what they see as silence in the face of tragedy. I want to say that we hear you, we understand why you feel so strongly, and that we care, too. A few things about this. One, that is the level of specificity he goes into in this open letter, which is not great. what, what events in the Middle East are you referring to? Ben 15:34 constantly thinking over this entire process of, like, the meme of just, like, the goose chasing someone of just, like, what events in the Middle East, Martin? Mike 15:40 then also, like, I cannot stand it when somebody says, oh, we hear you. It's like, cool, I'm not a ghost. Good to know. Like, you hear me, but are you listening? And that, I think, is where a big part of the problem is, where it's just like, it really feels like they're getting all this feedback, and they're just like, oh, interesting. Anyway, and, there's just not a lot of substance there, I think, is what I'm getting at. Ben 16:05 the letter did feel like the equivalent of just sort of a condescending pet on the head. Mike 16:08 Mm-hmm. Ben 16:09 Like, don't worry, sweetie, we got it. Mike 16:11 the letter continues, quote, as we look to next year, we will ensure that all participating broadcasters respect the rules of the competition, and if they don't, you have a personal pledge from me, we will not tolerate it, and call it out. Cool. Like, what, what, what can you do with that, where it's just like, ah! Like, that's it? Like, Ben 16:32 yeah, yeah. Mike 16:33 this is like, oh, well, we were not tolerated. It's like, oh, really? Because it really took you quite a while to get to this, like, rules discussion, let alone, like, actually putting something out for a vote. And calling it out, let's talk about that for, that previous paragraph, where, like, you're not calling it out specifically. Ben 16:50 Yeah, it's like, you're not even, yeah, you're not even naming the president of RTVE in Spain, from the top rope. I don't go on, Twitter much anymore, but just, like, reading that, just, like, chef's kiss, because, just, like, today, Martin Green has addressed the public in a letter. He does so with the festival and flames, five countries withdrawn, artists who will not accept the national pre-selection to go to Eurovision, major festival stars positioning themselves against Israel's participation, and the greatest reputational crisis in the history of the EBU. That's something. Mike 17:19 again, it just kind of goes back to, like, one of the main rules of the contest, do not bring the contest into disrepute. circling back to the question that we asked after the 2024 contest, how do you enforce that when it's the organization bringing the contest into disrepute? Ben 17:34 Mm-hmm. It's just, like, what is, wha is disrepute at this point? Like, what would cause that? Mike 17:40 I'm not surprised that this is how the vote turned out. Like, I fully expected this to be the objective outcome of the vote, but the way it's played out, I think that is where the sucker punch came in. like, just from a procedural standpoint, like, I just don't think the EBU had a good strategy going in. Like, I think the first one, I think there was a good strategy going in. Like, I do not like that the vote on participation was lumped in with the overall rules piece of it. but, yeah, if they just, either not have the Extraordinary Session or have the vote. Call the question. Like, if you think that you are in the correct position and that your membership agrees that you are in the correct position, then there is no risk to having the vote. Because the vote will go that way. Ben 18:42 Yeah, the vote will go the way you want it. everybody can be mad at their individual broadcaster instead of at you, the organization at large. I don't think that there is a version of this vote that does not lead to some level of, I'm trying to think of the correct word, because, like, hubbub feels wrong here. Yeah. There, there's going to be reaction regardless of how this vote goes out, and you have chosen the way that sort of diffuses, that irritation or that displeasure, the worst way. It completely continues to focus it on the EBU. Mike 19:13 it feels like they are choosing the path of most resistance. I ------ What is happening after the Eurovision vote? ------ 19:17 Mike 19:17 guess we're all part of the resistance now. Yay! Ben 19:20 See ya. Mike 19:21 Ah, goodness. So, yeah, I guess we can talk about, like, what is happening now, like, a little bit more present tense instead of what's happened over the last couple of weeks. Ben 19:30 Exactly, and like, this is a developing situation. Junior Eurovision appears to be the jangling keys in front of the news machine. Thank you, Junior Eurovision. Mike 19:52 national finals appear to be continuing as scheduled, although not without controversy. there is a staff group at Serbia's broadcaster RTS, calling on the broadcaster to boycott the contest. Uh, in Portugal, uh, they've announced the artists and composers that will be competing, for Festival de Concejo. but 17 of the people in that list, have indicated that they will not compete in Eurovision if their entry is a member of Eurovision if their entry is the winner of the festival. and the festival introduced a rule this year similar to Italy, where the winner has right of first refusal. Albania's, Festival de Congas, is still happening this week. It is the, Albanian National Song Festival, uh, which predates their participation in Eurovision. So, not, not expecting any changes there. Uh, Montenegro's Monta Song, uh, they are having their second edition this coming Sunday. prior to all of this, Cyprus did announce that their artist will be Antigone, who is an alum of, the UK's Love Island. So I know we have previously predicted that a, a, a, a Love Island winner would be a Eurovision contestant at some point. She didn't win, but, uh, yeah, I feel like we get half credit for that I mean, good luck to any other internal selection that is going to be announced in this media environment. I think they're going to have a, a difficult 2026 to say the least. Ben 21:17 in the previous version of these show notes, I had been, trying to figure out some sort of joke about Greek drama for, uh, the Cyprus announcement. Here we are, a Greek drama playing out before our eyes. I'm just like, wow, everybody doing stuff. in terms of other things, uh, making Martin Green CBE have to like fire up the press release machine, uh, NAMO, the winner of the 2024 contest is returning their trophy to the EBU. they had a lovely post on explaining their thoughts behind that, They're a real one. They have been pretty vocal this entire time. they have posted a photo of the trophy in a box, uh, being mailed to Geneva. Uh, and like, it's inspired like a couple other responses, uh, Charlie McGettigan, who is part of the duo that won the 1994 contest in Ireland for Ireland. posted a lovely video Mike 23:55 Yeah. That was, I don't even think he meant it to be as much of a sideswipe as it read, um, but yeah, uh, like, I, I giggled. Uh, Ben 24:06 Mm-hmm. it's just incredibly sweet that was in the period where just like, the trophy was different every year. Mike 24:13 Mm-hmm. Yeah. It was the one, like, uh, trying to think, just like, wait, what did that trophy look like? And in my mind, I was thinking, wait, was that the one that looks like a roll of aluminum foil? And, uh, yeah, you dug it up. And, uh, yeah, you dug it up. And, uh, yeah, you dug it up. And it is the one that looks like a roll of kind of crinkly Ben 24:27 foil. It Mike 24:28 aluminum Ben 24:28 is that one, and not the ones that I sort of describe as looking like the sort of acrylic tchotchke you would get from a late nineties tech conference. Mike 24:34 Right. but speaking of acrylic, tchotchkes, Clemen, Slovenia's 2025 entrant, he posted on Instagram that, the trophy that he created when he did his tribute to all of previous winners of Eurovision from the last 25 years. he will be sending that trophy along with an invoice, for getting it manufactured for that video, to the EBU. So, people are being kind of snark. Well, yeah, I mean, it's just like snark, snark, snark, can be a powerful motivator. So, uh, hi, everybody. Uh, Ben 25:07 like there were, I mean, there was also just like the, like the post he made to Instagram was very clearly formatted to look like the post Neymar made to Instagram. Mike 25:14 Mm-hmm. Ben 25:15 Not now, bro. Not now. Mike 25:16 Yeah. it was leading to a kind of interesting conversation, the group chat about like, oh, are other artists going to be following on this? And I was just kind of thinking, well, wait, where are the trophies? Because I don't think every winner has it on their shelves because didn't Kalush Orchestra auction off their trophy? Ben 25:33 Yeah. Mike 25:34 Yeah. Ben 25:34 Yeah. Mike 25:34 So they don't have theirs. Salvador Sabral, who's been very vocal in Portugal RTP should withdraw Ben 25:41 Should Mike 25:41 from the Ben 25:41 boycott, Mike 25:41 contest. Ben 25:42 yeah. Mike 25:42 Yeah. I was just like, oh, wait, I'm not sure if he has the trophy either. If anybody has it, I would think it was his sister, Louisa, who actually wrote, uh, Amor Paralous Deutsch. meanwhile, in the fan community, like the responses have been pretty strong and pretty immediate as well. the, uh, organization behind pre-party España, uh, announced that they will be canceling their event. it's an event that's been held since 2017. Uh, the organizers of the Barcelona pre-party have also, uh, announced that, due to Spain's withdrawal, they will not be hosting, uh, the pre-parties this year. And those are two pretty big pre-parties, And then moderators of various Eurovision communities, uh, Eurovision discord and Reddit, uh, had a lot of people from those posts and understandable. I mean, that seems like a tough job that I absolutely would never want. And this year in particular, I think it's just going to be even worse. Ben 26:40 Yes. Mike 26:40 Yeah. And then a lot of podcasts and streamers and content creators are retooling, pausing production for 2026 or fully closing up shop. that's, a lot of voices that are not going to be heard this season. talking about these I guess. kind of segue ------ What will be happening? ------ 27:00 Mike 27:00 into what is happening and like what our plans are moving forward Ben 27:06 yeah hello we are not several podcasts we are one podcast you you and i had had a chat after the news dropped and after we had processed some of that but like what are we gonna do like how do we feel about this at least on my end, I had a feeling that felt very office space, uh, Michael Bolton. They're the ones who suck, why do I have to change? as you had said, like, I was not expecting the vote to go I was expecting that we were gonna get to this spot of just, like, yeah, the rules have been, these are the rules, Israel is still participating. Mike 27:35 Mm-hmm. Ben 27:36 Uh, I wasn't expecting me to hit me, like, it did. part of what I have loved about discovering Eurovision has been all of the national finals, and just sort of getting to see are, maybe not necessarily united by music these days, but certainly, uh, the music, music television is just very fun for me to watch, like, that is very exciting for me to watch, and, like, I still want to watch national finals. I think we both still want to watch national finals. That is where, that's something we, we like, that's something that we enjoy covering from, like, January to March. So, uh, we're gonna shift our focus for the first part of this year, from Eurovision 2026 to coverage of the national song contests. I kind of like that this is gonna give us an opportunity to explore individual countries more and their selection formats, because generally, we're super busy. I am already dreading February 28th and the fact that we currently have four things happening that weekend, but it gives us a chance to kind of slow down a little bit on those and get a little bit deeper on those as those are happening. we save all of our brand management nightmare snarking, uh, to our blue sky at Euro wats. Uh, please continue to tune in there Mike 28:41 Yeah. And I mean, that for me is kind of a big part of it where it's just, this is interesting to watch and like, granted, there is a large emotional component to it as well. But Ben 28:54 Mm-hmm. Mike 28:55 at the same time, we are seeing this case study of like brand management and fan engagement and fan studies. Like, it's just, it's just hitting all of my academic like receptors and it's just like, Oh, like, just please hook this to my veins. but that's not a tone that I really want to have on the show because I know that that is not all like what our listeners are like fully tuned into. And, um, yeah, like they may, they may not appreciate, the snark aspect of it. we are trying to be mindful of our tone, but at the same time, stop stepping on every single rake, once national final season is done, we're planning on continuing doing deep dives on various countries. Uh, the ones that we are particularly interested in are Ireland, Slovenia, Spain,Iceland , and Netherlands. We did do a deep dive on Netherlands when they hosted back in 2020 and 2021, but, uh, some things have changed in the last five years. the way that I keep thinking about this is it's a little bit of a whistle stop tour to like, just hit all the countries. It's like, well, we haven't talked about Moldova cause Moldova hasn't won the contest yet. but we still want to give them the same level of attention that we have given other countries that have been fortunate enough to win the contest. and I guess purely from a selfish standpoint, we were so close to episode 300 and we really want to hit that milestone. the way it's mapped out, that's going to happen like sometime mid April. that also seems like a rest point to see where things are, where we think things are going and figure out the next phase of the plan. Um, but, the short version of this is we're not planning on doing our standard review series coverage that we've done for the last seven editions of the contest. we're just figuring out the navigation this in real time, uh, the same way that all of you are probably figuring out how you are going to with Eurovision, then not just the next year, but going forward. Ben 30:49 like this has been a really weird time. And like, I even like a difficult time just as somebody who's been a part of this fandom for a while. I'm not the only person that's happening to you. This is happening both for us as individuals, as co-hosts of the show, but also for just like the greater Eurovision fan community at large, I'm particularly excited about what we're doing for our next episode. Uh, friend of the show, Dr. Zoe Jay, reached out to us and was like, hey, I- I have some thoughts some stuff that's coming out of my research about how fans navigate their fandom when the object of fandom crosses a line into becoming problematic. she's studying within the Eurovision community for the last few years. I'm delighted, uh, she reached out to us. I'm really excited about this chat. Mike 31:29 I am, too. Ben 31:30 I hope, uh, y'all will join us for that, uh, but also, if you have fully noped out, that is also Mike 31:36 Yes, Ben 31:36 fine. Mike 31:37 yes . I mean, if you- if you have made it to this point, in this particular episode, thank you. And, and any decisions that you make, no judgment here, everybody's gotta make their own choices for, how they want to engage with this. and we're figuring it out, too. If you want to join us on that journey, you're more than welcome. We'd love to have that's going to do it for this episode of the EuroWatt. Thanks for listening. The EuroWatt podcast is hosted by Mike McComb, that's me, and Ben Smith. Ben 32:04 That's me! You can find our full archive of episodes over on our website at EuroWatt.com. Over on Patreon, we'll be covering our pop culture consumption for 2025. Join the EuroWatt AV Club to get access to that episode and dozens more by visiting patreon.com slash EuroWatt. Mike 32:19 Next time on the EuroWatt, we'll be discussing Fandom Detachment with Dr. Zoe Jay from the University of Helsinki.