Here's a entertaining/embarrassing story from Spain, related to this.
A few years ago (2008), the Spanish organisers of the Eurovision contest thought it would be a great idea to allow the public to decide who should represent the country in the Eurovision contest. Amongst all songs entered was this silly parody from a comedian, playing a fake musician called Chikilicuatre [0].
So well... After some heavy campaigning/trolling by the TV channel that 'created' this character and song, it came out as the winner. You can imagine the organisers' face after this! But they sullenly accepted it and let him join the contest [1].
Eurovision is supposed to be fun though. At least, that's the UK's perspective. Everyone else takes it more seriously and submit almost exclusively tedious rock ballads. They're been a few non-boring entries though, including a finish metal band and a pair of clowns from Ireland.
Well, it's fun nowadays... Before 2008 the fun entries were still novelty rather than the norm (it had pretty much been only Lordi until then - and I would consider them awesome rather than fun :)).
A few years ago (2008), the Spanish organisers of the Eurovision contest thought it would be a great idea to allow the public to decide who should represent the country in the Eurovision contest. Amongst all songs entered was this silly parody from a comedian, playing a fake musician called Chikilicuatre [0].
So well... After some heavy campaigning/trolling by the TV channel that 'created' this character and song, it came out as the winner. You can imagine the organisers' face after this! But they sullenly accepted it and let him join the contest [1].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodolfo_Chikilicuatre
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRQhZtbm97I
P.S. They learned their lesson and changed the voting system so it could not be exploited again.