Eurovision 2014 - 06/08/10 May 2014

Why on Earth isn't the on-screen caption enough to explain that text voting and apps aren't available in the UK? They could even read this information out over the "recap" section, they don't need to talk over presenters.

Anybody trying to text vote in the UK will have a flaming hard time when they discover THERE IS NO NUMBER TO TEXT so they don't even need to worry about defrauding people. Just a line of text saying "no sms voting in the UK" is all that's needed.

I think the hosts should look after the fact that half of possible voters can't actually vote in that show. However, it is always going to be up to the BBC to cover over the details about text / app voting. I don't think there's anything wrong with a "sorry, to interrupt, but he's telling us about text voting, which isn't available to UK voters, but while he's doing that, a reminder that you must not vote before the lines are opened after all the performances, or after they're closed, otherwise you may still be charged and your vote will not count". It shouldn't take any longer, and we don't miss anything that is relevant to us.

That would be fair enough I suppose.

Perhaps the problem with Scott Mills that he's used to radio. On the radio, you ONLY shut up if there's a song playing, otherwise there's dead air. It's not the same on TV and I would very much like him to shut up more.

I do hope nobody blind or partially sighted watches this song competition.

It's worrying when you still notice so much ignorance towards blind and partially sighted people.

What happens to the semi finals iff bbc 3 closes as all competing nations have to show them - bbc 2 maybe still with filler though because that what they do fortunately or unfortunately. iF ITV ever had it would they do it differently?

Is the BBC the only broadcaster within the Eurovision not to show commercials? I dare say ITV would take the feed from the host country and take the ad breaks like the rest of them do...

I wouldn't be completely opposed to having an ad break from each country as a "postcard" one year - would probably actually reveal more about the countries than the postcards anyway.

So earlier in the week we were talking about venues in the "hypothetical" sense. After last night's semi-final I think we should maybe begin to consider who hosts it.

Let's go through it then. Imagine if BBC Three only had a caption. A blind or partially sighted person is watching Eurovision. For some reason they want to vote by SMS. Not knowing that SMS voting is unavailable in the UK (despite it not being available on any mainstream programme in the UK), they pick up their mobile teleephone and...

That's it. What is the worse that can happen? There will not be a shortcode for them to send the text to, there will not be a keyword for them to start the text with. They will not be able to vote. They will not have lost anything.

"Hypothetically" if we bag it, I'm thinking another three presenter scenario, with Graham Norton, and then two from the following four... Tess Daly, Davina McCall, Claudia Winkleman, or the new golden girl Emma Willis. Just watching the semi final last night, I was wondering when the contest transitioned from a tuxedo'd / evening dress sort of event to more of a concert style presentation? Was that when it went from Dublin 1997 to Birmingham 1998? Was Birmingham also the last time we saw a live orchestra? Last thought of the night, as it's an ABBA anniversary this year, what's the chance of them appearing in the live, with a few bars from Waterloo with a quick segue into Thank you For The Music. It would be awesome

If we did win it, would the bbc be forced to take app and SMS voting for the contest. As they currently don't as they can't guarantee it'll get counted in time.

No they wouldn't. Digame would still be looking after the voting systems under their contract with the EBU.