Physicists Uncover TV Show Biases 435
Tsalg writes "Interesting to see what scientists can uncover from watching one of the silliest TV shows in Europe, where singers represent countries in a contest, and then countries vote for.. for what exactly? Well it was reported in a Nature article where the show was used as a barometer of European nations' feelings about their neighbours, that
Britain is in harmony with Europe, Nordic countries fancy each others' stars, and France is out on a limb."
Lalah (Score:5, Interesting)
Hell it's the best reason to watch for us in the UK. The back handed comments rock.
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Lalah (Score:5, Informative)
This year, we lost out right at the bottom, with only 18 points. Compare that to a Moldovan granny banging a drum, which sailed on to 6th place with 128 points. And, before you ask, the granny in question was beating the drum from a rocking chair on stage. The commentary before and after that little number was hilarious.
The real problem with Eurovision, is the underlying politics. The Eastern European and Baltic Countries cannot dismiss this as a singing competition. They instead fight furiously for votes, and vote for the neighbours whenever possible. This is what is turning the whole competition into a farce... the Baltic 'block voting' means that the 4 primary contributors to the European economy (France, UK, Germany and Spain) are the last 4 on the leaderboard -- year after year.
I makes me wonder exactly why we continue this ridiculous tradition -- Greece gives 12 points to Cyprus, Cyprus gives 12 points to Greece, and on and on... Quite frankly also, the singing was abysmal -- I can sing better when drunk than the winning entry this year, and that is saying something.
Re:Lalah (Score:5, Insightful)
Umm, because previously European matters of national pride (read "pissing contests") were settled (or not) with guns and bombs.
Stick with the dumb TV contests - fewer refugees that way, and it will allow Europeans to hold on to their self image as peaceful, war hating types.
Re:Lalah (Score:2)
No, Europe were the bloodiest set of warmongers on the planet. Britain happened to be rather good at it.
possible misconceptions (Score:5, Insightful)
As for your second point, why would the amount of money contributed to the EU correlate in any way with the popularity of the songs? Looking above, you'd expect the opposite, actually. A country is a large contributor because it's, well, a large country. And a large country tend (other things being equal) to be more insular and less influenced by the cultures around it. The songs will tend not to appeal as widely among its neighbours or other european countries as the smaller, more exposed, countries.
And yes, musically it's rather like a slow-motion trainwreck, but that's part of the appeal
Re:Lalah (Score:2, Insightful)
But yea we're getting owned but that just proves Europe hated the war no?
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Lalah (Score:5, Informative)
You can't quite blame that on friendship voting though. (I.e. they got points from a lot more places than just their neighbors)
The group in question (Zdob si Zdub [zdob-si-zdub.com]), is an established group in East Europe (4 albums), with several hits and are pretty well known in Russia, the Ukraine, Belarus, Romania, Hungary, etc.
Like them or not, a lot of East Europe does and that's more of a cultural thing than a friendship thing.
Friendship only goes so far too.. Norway only gave Sweden (who's song totally sucked) a single point.
Re:Lalalalalalalalah (Score:2)
And this is different from all the other country's entries how?
the AC
who got invited to at least 3 eurovision parties this year
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Interesting)
The most interesting part for me was seeing things like Turkey giving Greece maximum points, and Serbia and Croatia giving each other a lot of points (hey, the war was a good 10 years ago).
The Germans coming last (less than half the points of anyone else) also provoked a bit of national soul-searching. Only a bit though
Oh yes, and when I drove home that night there were some cars on the road beeping their horns with massive Greek flags bei
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Lalah (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Lalah (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Lalah (Score:4, Interesting)
His comment about the winner - "a plain looking girl who has overcome her shyness for tonight" - was also priceless. As with his commentary about the Norwegian act - "Freddy Mercury will spin in his grave!"
Another great Wogan comment (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Another great Wogan comment (Score:2)
Britain in harmony? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Britain in harmony? (Score:2)
That's *news*? (Score:2)
Re:That's *news*? (Score:2)
IIWAP (Score:3, Interesting)
I would find a more scientific subject to study, you know, that is actually related to physics.
Re:IIWAP (Score:3, Funny)
IYWAP... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:IYWAP... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:IYWAP... (Score:2)
My friends were out watching ROTS. I would have been there too, but oh no, I had to be at home watching Eurovision, didn't I?
Y'know, sometimes having a girlfriend isn't all it's cracked up to be. :o)
Re:IYWAP... (Score:2)
Do people in the rest of Europe really take it seriously? Nobody in the UK does.
Very poor article (Score:2)
Re:IIWAP (Score:2, Insightful)
> I would find a more scientific subject to study, you know, that is actually related to physics.
The study shows a bias in the statistics, that such a system is not stocastic. This is a good lesson for any physics researcher. Do you think all physics is quarks and quasars? It's much more mundane than you may realize.
btw, my BA is in physics.
jfs
Re:IIWAP (Score:2)
IMHO, this "Javine" person pictured in TFA appears worthy of further study.
Caption - "Javine is Britain's hope for winning this year's Eurovision song contest."
Sub-caption - "She's no Moldovian granny banging a drum, but there you are."For example (Score:4, Funny)
The first student suggested moment of inertia about the z axis. The second amended this by suggesting it be divided by the natural period of oscillation. In other words, the measure represents a compromise between curviness and jiggliness.
Now, I need hardly add that for these two young men, this was a purely theoretical exercise. Neither at the time had the least discernable empirical experience with the female sex, because dates for them were about as elusive as the Higgs boson. It wasn't until a few years brought a bit more maturity that they actually dated and eventually got married, an outcome I suppose that may justify some optimism for the prospects of many Slashdotters.
Not such a bad assumption (Score:2)
Not just a better topic, but much better assumptions. Look at what they say in the last paragraph:
That sounds worse than it is. They're not assuming that all of the songs are equally good, they're just assuming that the quality of the songs is not correlated with the nationa
Feh... (Score:5, Funny)
But eventually, all other countries adopt the principles put forth by France.
Re:Feh... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Feh... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Feh... (Score:2)
Looking at the picture, I guess they couldn't find an actual metric clock. It has 10 "hours" marked out, but still 60 pips for the minutes. Of course this was nearly 80 years ago and the only way to "freeze frame" was with an editing machine, so the props guys probably didn't think that level of detail was n
Re:Feh... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Feh... (Score:4, Insightful)
Which forefront are you talking about? The Revolution of 1789, which took place 14 years after the English colonies in North America had their revolution? Or when Napolean took over the Republic and abandoned it for another monarchy with his family in charge? Or when his son dissolved the second Republic and declared the French Empire? Or maybe you're thinking of the Vichy government's collaboration with the Nazis?
France is many things, but a model of how to run a liberal utopia it is not. It's a nation with as complicated, confused, and self-contradictory a history as any other. It deserves neither the unqualified praise you imply in your post, nor the unqualified derision it receives from the American right.
Re:Feh... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Feh... (Score:2)
Credit where it is due: the American Revolution wouldn't have succeeded without assistance from the French.
You do have to give it to the French people for really taking the American Revolution to heart and starting their own. Perhaps it wasn't as decisive as the American one, but it seems that the French are responsible for ending monoarchies in Europe.
Lafayette and US support (Score:2, Interesting)
By the way, I think that French helped Americans just to piss off the english and reduce England's supremacy over there.
Finally, US governement didn't
Re:Feh... (Score:2)
Re:Feh... (Score:3, Insightful)
I not that Germany did the opposite by making a totally bland song in english where they sing about "dollars" - wtf?
Re:Feh... (Score:2, Interesting)
Slightly out of date (Score:5, Insightful)
To anyone else that read the article... (Score:2, Interesting)
As usual, Europeans do odd things better than US (Score:5, Funny)
David Letterman, though, does acknowledge that his very popular "Will It Float" segment is based on the original British "Is It Buoyant."
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:4, Funny)
Only because the majority of American's don't know what the word "buoyant" means.
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
Do what now?
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
And because the rest of them don't know how to properly use apostrophes.
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
Hey, I don't mind you insulting those of us in the US (we generally deserve it anyways), but please leave the Candians, Mexicans, Central Americans, and the South Americans out of it.
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
Re:As usual, Europeans do odd things better than U (Score:2)
I think it's closer to the non-funny-therefore-funny model. As with most of Letterman's long-running gags, it ceases to be about the actual activity at hand (like throwing things off the building, etc), and more about
Re: [sic] (Score:2)
For those not in Europe.. (Score:5, Informative)
Generally twenty four countries make it through to the final (which is all most people watch).. four of those are automatic placements from the main contributors (UK, France, Germany, Spain) and the rest survived the semi-final.
Then they all perform a song, most of which are hideously awful, and sometimes ham up national stereotypes in the most hysterical of manners (this year, Moldova had a crazy celtic style thrash rock song with some 90 year old woman banging a drum)
Inevitably, national biases always come out. Greece and Cyprus often give each other 12 points, all the Nordic countries vote for each other, and, nowadays, all the Baltic states vote for each other too. Until recently, Greece and Turkey would never give each other any points.
The whole contest is really an opportunity to laugh at our fellow Europeans, see some hideous songs which will never make it anywhere, and listen to some great commentary which pokes fun at the whole charade.
Re:For those not in Europe.. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:For those not in Europe.. (Score:3)
Re:For those not in Europe.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Cult status (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:For those not in Europe.. (Score:5, Informative)
Relax. Nobody in Europe watches this without getting seriously hammered.
I swear.
Re:For those not in Europe.. (Score:2)
What? You don't like tone-deaf Alanis Morisette wannabes?
To confirm these findings, physicists plan... (Score:4, Funny)
Every year, the same bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Every year, the same bullshit (Score:2)
Don't you like the Numa Numa Dance?
Reminds me of... (Score:2)
I wonder though, is Britain more "European" because larger immigrant blocks vote for their home countrymen?
Re:Reminds me of... (Score:2)
Given that the vast majority of British immigrants come from outside Europe (source UK government International Migration Estimates 2002) and that immigrants as a whole make up a single digit percentage of the population, it seems pretty unlikely that they would make much difference. Where immigrants do make a difference on national Eurovision votes (Germany, for example) it seems to be in countrie
Visualizations? (Score:4, Insightful)
It would be extremely interesting to see the votes mapped onto a social relationships chart, if only to confirm the groupings and the weak bonds between certain members of groups to tie them to the others.
Doing some kind of statistical analysis based on previous year's set voting patterns and then removing their significance from the current result might actually give an idea of who was the best artist, contrary to the winner of the popular vote.
Re:Visualizations? (Score:2)
Hispanics had a performance bias going against them (they were voted off earlier rounds when strong players are desireable, and kept in later rounds when weaker players are desireable) and the elderly had a general bias against them (they were voted off in all phases of the game
You have to be kidding me... (Score:3, Insightful)
I can see the next
"SEC - Something isn't right at SCO"
In related news... (Score:5, Funny)
(mod parent hilarious) Re:In related news... (Score:2)
Thanks for the only genuine laugh I got out of this thread!
Traditional Antipathies and Alliances Affect Votes (Score:2)
I'm not sure why this is Nature, and I'm even more confused as to why this is at Slashdot.
Re:Traditional Antipathies and Alliances Affect Vo (Score:2)
Methinks you responded to the wrong comment, our you're just spamming.
assumptions flawed (Score:3, Insightful)
Which is why Terry Wogan's commentary is so entertaining, and well worth a watch over dinner and a few drinks.
BTW this years winner was Greece and France were last...
The funny thing is... (Score:2, Informative)
For those in the US, it's actually a large elaborate practical joke to make make people look silly.
Re:The funny thing is... (Score:2)
I'm not so sure about that - how else can you explain the success of a certain Dana International [wikipedia.org] a few years ago?
(Yes, Israel won the contest thanks to the performance of a male-to-female transsexual. You can't make this up!)
We need research for this?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Scoreboard, final [eurovision.tv]
Scoreboard, semi-final [eurovision.tv]
In this case, statistics don't lie. Or at least they agree with this report, so in that case it'd lie too.
For example, you'll see that Sweden got their two highest scores from Denmark and Finland and zero points from most others.
This is also commonly happening in eastern europe, and yet an example of it can be seen with Croatia and Serbia & Montenegro.
Voting on your neighbors has happened for a long time in the ESC so it's not news, and it's usually part as just a friendly gesture from the televoters and part because the countries have similar taste in music. Any watcher of this show would've noticed this fairly easily too.
Personally I think most music there suck horribly, and don't take the competition too seriously, although it's a bit annoying when friend voting go overboard and their top scores is given to a country that has some obviously extremely poor song. But then again, maybe it's just me having a culture collision and they honestly found it was good. Europe is so diverse in cultures that it's entirely possible.
It's kind of funny though; at least this time neither France or Germany seemed to get *any* friendship votes from their neighbors.
-1, Uninformative (Score:2)
Re:-1, Uninformative (Score:2)
I'll give the article (Score:3, Funny)
Talk about stating the obvious!
In unrelated news... (Score:4, Funny)
More Analysis... (Score:4, Informative)
Eurovision, the reality (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that nobody takes it seriously. If they did, they'd pit their best singers and performers against each other. Instead (at least in the UK & Ireland) it's more like a talent show with the people choosing the least worst of a handful of songs to represent the country.
Just look at Ireland this year. They have the likes of U2, The Corrs, The Cranberries, Enya, Phil Coulter, Van Morrison and even *spit* Westlife. So who did they send to compete? Two nobodies - a 15 year old ginger four eyes and his sister to sing some dirge about "Love". The sad part is that they chose these two after a long running sub-Pop Idol kind of competition.
So naturally when the songs are so appalling, the votes are heavily slanted to their Euro-pals. This year the finalists were heavily Eastern European so the vote reflected that. The stalwarts like the UK, France & Germany finished miserably.
Another weird thing is observing how the songs from past years get ripped off in the following year's competition. Turkey won a couple of years back and you could still hear ripped off riffs from their entry even this year.
Distance-weighted adjustment (Score:5, Interesting)
I got a map of Europe, used the locations of the capital cities as surrogate coordinates, computed the distance matrix, and reweighted the score from the Eurovision website to adjust for this.
Here's the top 5 from my adjusted list (left) and the original list (right):
cyprus 280 ukraine 280
ukraine 273 serbiamontenegro 263
greece 263 greece 252
turkey 245 turkey 195
serbiamontenegro 199 cyprus 170
So Cyprus jumped four places by my system into first place!
I should have cranked this system up again for this year, offered it to the TV companies, profit!!
The big irony is that I had a proper scientific paper (on malaria prevalence) REJECTED by Nature this year, and then they produce this fluff! Gah!
Baz
out on a limb (Score:3, Funny)
Oh and why does it alywas have to a huge argument whenever France is mentionned ?
Last, why are PHYSICISTS qualified to perform such an analysis ? "Nuclear physicist says French painters like eating pork". Huh ?
Re:out on a limb (Score:3, Informative)
Physicists tend to be good at applying statistics to real world phenomena because they do that a lot. So if a physicist tells you something statistical you should listen to them.
Link to the Data (Score:4, Informative)
uncover this.. (Score:2)
Re:uncover this.. (Score:2)
Re:uncover this.. (Score:2)
why has the UK been consistently entering shit songs and shit performers for several years straight? is this on purpose?
Because winning Eurovision means that that country gets to host it next year, which is extremely expensive. Rumours abound that Ireland's winning spree during the 1990's almost bankrupted RTE, the Irish state broadcaster. Winning is fine if you're some newly-independent state or if you're trying to promote your country to the world for tourism or political purposes. It's expensive b
That's entertainment... (Score:2, Interesting)
It's a chance to watch something different on TV, a break from other 364 days of fake reality shows and marketing-written soaps.
Some take the contest more seriously than others of course, but if you don't love it, you love to hate it.
I actually have a couple of points to offer:
Ah, But The Corrs Weren't Playing! (Score:2)
Everybody loves them in Europe - from Ireland to England to France to Germany to Spain to Italy!
I was just watching one of their 2004 concerts in Benidorm, Spain. Somebody threw a teddy bear up on the stage for Andrea (she gets a LOT of teddy bears - at the Ischgl performance, there was a stack of 3 or 4 of them on the drum riser!). Jim started playing a piano ditty, she started dancing with the teddy bear. The audience began singing "Ole! Ole!" and the rest of the band then jumped in and played along.
Re:Those holier-than-thou French (Score:2)
Re:Those holier-than-thou French (Score:3, Funny)
As a Londoner, I have to say that because of the fantastically low-cut tops that were being worn by some of the female performers, I was most certainly not complaining about thrupenny bits during the show...
Re:Those holier-than-thou French (Score:2)
Another important thing is that various cultures consider a good song differently. The notion of "good" varies. Just like "good food" in the US is not the same as "good food" in the UK (well, UK traditional food is usually anything boiled, but that's another story).
Thus my analysis of those results is that
Re:Physicists? (Score:3, Funny)
Read the orignal paper, not Nature's summary (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)