Eurovision?

Boom bang-a-bang bang! The Eurovision Song Contest is about to get bigger and better.

Boom bang-a-bang bang! The Eurovision Song Contest is about to get bigger and better.

Fans will soon be treated to a two-day kitschfest instead of the present one evening. New countries will be invited to take part. A more flexible definition of the European landmass will extend the contest to Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and the Vatican. Voting patterns, always infused with a tinge of international (particularly Balkan) politics, should be interesting. Just as today, Turkish juries rarely give full points to the Greek entry (and vice versa), and the Croats show an unexpected fondness for entries from Macedonia (and vice versa). It will be interesting to see how an Israeli jury places the new nations.

In any case, we can look forward to something more exotic. To the European Broadcasting Union, organisers of the contest, we say: Congratulations!