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Physicists Uncover TV Show Biases

Posted by Hemos on from the the-joy-of-statistics dept.

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."

7 of 435 comments (clear)

  1. Lalah by Turn-X+Alphonse · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Watch the UK broadcast of it if you can get hold of it. The "host" has been doing it for years, he always comments on it and points it out every time people vote for "friends". It's been that way for years and always will be.

    Hell it's the best reason to watch for us in the UK. The back handed comments rock.

    --
    I like muppets.
    1. Re:Lalah by tuxette · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Yes, he's still the commentator. One of the best quotes the whole night was after Ukraine's performance (the Orange Revolution rap song): "I wonder how many votes that will get from Russia?"

      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!"

      --
      People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
    2. Re:Lalah by siriuskase · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Is this going to be the next European TV show that gets imported to the US? I can imagine, state vs state, backhanded compliments to who? Alabama? 50 is a lot of states, maybe they will do regions.

      --
      If you must moderate, please moderate as irrelevent, not something bad, because I'm sure someone will find this interest
  2. IIWAP by WormholeFiend · · Score: 3, Interesting

    (If I Was A Physicist)...

    I would find a more scientific subject to study, you know, that is actually related to physics.

  3. Re:Feh... by Lars+T. · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The American "Revolution" that didn't take place in a whole country and totally changed the way of government for it, but instead happened on a different continent, and didn't scratch the British monarchy in the slightest? Maybe you take your little uprising in the backwoods a tad too seriously? Ignoring how that would have ended if the French hadn't helped you...

    --

    Lars T.

    To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck

  4. Cult status by Random+Walk · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I don't know about other european countries, but at least here in Germany, the show has gained cult status among gay people...and at least once in recent years the German performer was an artist/comedian that went to the contest just to poke fun at it :) Many people like it just because it's garbage, sort of like "Attack of the killer tomatoes".

  5. Distance-weighted adjustment by Bazman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Last year I computed a distance-weighted adjustment of the Eurovision scores, on the basis that if you voted for a country far away from you, you must have really liked the song since its cultural attachments to you are weaker than a song from your neighbour. So if you like faraway songs they must be really good, and hence worthy of more marks.

    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