Heroes wasn't a big hit in Europe, it fell off the charts really quickly and only achieved a Gold certification in Norway, Spain and Austria. Never heard it anywhere in Italy.
And it's not true that only diaspora votes. What is exactly Denmark's diaspora? They won the televote in 2013. Was it Italy's diaspora in Iceland that made us win the televote there? Please... the winner is always popular in ALL Europe. Even Sergey Lazarev got no less than 3 points from every single country.

I've never watched 2003 and holy shi* it was so crazy/cheesy

2003 is easily the worst year since the televote was introduced
But Don't Break My Heart (the Romanian entry) is an ahead of its time bop.

in 2003, top 3 deserved their places

Also *ALL* the fanfaves losing in their NFs making her pretty much the only real favorite left.

What is this blasphemy. 2003 was divine! best year of the millennium with 2005.

It was so close!

The early 2000s seemed a lot more fun than Eurovision today, but that is true of music in general. Music was 10x more cheesy, tacky, and bright in the early-mid 2000s than today. On one hand I kinda miss it because I do enjoy the eccentricity and how fun it seemed to be, on the other hand, I quite like it being a bit more credible and this year was probably the year where I liked the most songs (didn't stan for that many though tbh)

Still better than Black Smoke

omg thanks god i was too young then and the first Eurovision i remembered is Esc 2004

Almost all the songs are awful not just averege , TERRIBLE.
and i thought that my country (Greece) was tragic that year

also Germany and Poland

2005 was another trash year I struggle to find more than 6 songs I like in the final. But My Number One is the best performance of all time, and it won, so that's good.

Greece's 2003 entry was bad, but your 2002 song (S.A.G.A.P.O.)... whew, that's another level of TRAGIC!

Russia deserved to end dead last (don't let Kworb see this). Romania should've taken its place in the top 3, but it was too ~ahead of its time~

Wrong password.

What do we think Russia will try next year?

2012 - The Grannies were always going to get into the Top 3. Eccentric as fuc*, pretty unique and so Eurovision. Unlucky to win but that was Queen Loreen' win.
2013 - Similar to 2015, except not as good. Still enjoyed it, unlucky not to win imo.
2014 - Quite a traditional Eurovision sound with the eccentricity of the sisters and weird af peformance.
2015 - Yuge typical-Eurovision power ballad.
2016 - Good looking male singer with a mixture of contemporary and traditional Eurovision sound; clearly took inspiration from Mans..

They've tried everything and are clearly throwing a lot of money at it. Why is Putin so desperate for Eurovision

Russia's 2014 performance was ON POINT. Visually, the best of 2014. I think that they'll send someone like Zemfira: artistic, talented, but not boring.

I felt so bad when they got booed

Russia doesn't really do boring tbh, they normally send something worthy.

(i just followed you on Twitter btw and holy fk you look so familiar )

Maybe you've seen one of my Eurovision reviews on YT?

OMG YES

That'll be it

The 60 Maltese song titles are out and the titles are embarrassingly generic - but there's one song in Maltese!
We will hear only 16 of these in their national final.