Tonight !

It's time for you al to invite friends at home this evening and share one of the most popular TV entertainment of all times : the Eurovision song contest. It's tonight at 21:00 Paris time. Bring at the couch table the beers and wine bottles, and anything you can eat without going to the fridge like sodas and crisps. Put some cushions on the floor, give paper and pencil for everyone so you can make your own contest. It's more fun of course if some of your friends are from different countries, so you can notice the cultural differences. The Eurovision Song Contest (French: Concours Eurovision de la Chanson) is an annual competition held among active member countries of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). Each member country submits a song to be performed on live television and then casts votes for the other countries' songs to determine the most popular song in the competition. Each country participates via one of their national EBU-member television stations, whose task it is to select a singer and a song to represent their country in the international competition. The Contest has been broadcast every year since its inauguration in 1956 and is one of the longest-running television programmes in the world. It is also one of the most-watched non-sporting events in the world, with audience figures having been quoted in recent years as anything between 100 million and 600 million internationally. Eurovision has also been broadcast outside Europe to such places as Australia, Canada, Egypt, Hong Kong, India, Jordan, New Zealand, South Korea and the USA, despite the fact that these countries do not compete. Eligible participants include Active Members (as opposed to Associate Members) of the European Broadcasting Union. Active members are those whose states fall within the European Broadcasting Area, or otherwise those who are members of the Council of Europe. The European Broadcasting Area is defined by the International Telecommunication Union: The "European Broadcasting Area" is bounded on the west by the western boundary of Region 1, on the east by the meridian 40° East of Greenwich and on the south by the parallel 30° North so as to include the western part of the USSR, the northern part of Saudi Arabia and that part of those countries bordering the Mediterranean within these limits. In addition, Iraq, Jordan and that part of the territory of Turkey lying outside the above limits are included in the European Broadcasting Area. The western boundary of Region 1 is a line drawn west of Iceland down the centre of the Atlantic Ocean. Active members include broadcasting organisations whose transmissions are made available to (virtually) all of the population of the country in which they are based. If an EBU Active Member wishes to participate, they must fulfil conditions as laid down by the rules of the Contest (of which a separate copy is drafted annually). As of 2009, this includes the necessity to have broadcast the previous year's programme within their country, and paid the EBU a participation fee in advance of the deadline specified in the rules of the Contest for the year in which they wish to participate. Eligibility to participate is not determined by geographic inclusion within the continent of Europe, despite the "Euro" in "Eurovision" — nor does it have a direct connection with the European Union. Several countries geographically outside the boundaries of Europe have competed: Israel, Cyprus and Armenia, in Western Asia, since 1973, 1981 and 2004 respectively; and Morocco, in North Africa, in the 1980 competition alone. In addition, several transcontinental countries with only part of their territory in Europe have competed: Turkey, since 1975; Russia, since 1994; Georgia, since 2007; and Azerbaijan, which made its first appearance in the 2008 edition. Two of the countries that have previously sought to enter the competition, Lebanon and Tunisia, in Western Asia and North Africa respectively, are also outside of Europe. In 2009 the Gulf nation of Qatar announced its interest in joining the Contest by 2011.