Who Runs the TISC? Committee!

The Committee is quite simply a group of nations that have a perfect record of recognizing the winning material. Therefore the membership rules are straightforward – as long as you award any number of points to the eventual winner, you continue to be a member of the Committee. In a sense, the Committee is a group of individuals who seemingly decide the winner between themselves, as scoring high points from the Committee usually means the song will also be scoring well accross the board.

First theories about the Committee’s possible existence came to light during the run-up towards the 2016 Open. TISC Analytics Team were performing some TISC-related analyses when they accidentally stumbled on a fact that there are several nations who have always awarded points to the winners: Australia, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Morocco, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine and Vietnam. With bolded nations being scheduled to take part at the upcoming 2016 Open, TISC Analytics Team was quite eager to check if all theories about the Committee were actually true… And true they were. As one might suspect, number of songs that the votes of the Committee had in common were shrinking with each new set of votes. Until the very end, when quite incredibly Ireland remained the only nation featured on all of the Committee’s templates. Ireland’s “Runaway” won the 2016 Open with 198 points. The Committee has proven its point and since then it has gained quite a reputation within TISC community.

2017 Annual was a new test for the Committee. There was a lot to prove going into the Grand Final, as several sceptics still believed that the 2016 Open outcome was merely a fluke. The Committee however wouldn’t hear of it and yet again they completed the contest with each and every member awarding points to the British winning entry (“Human”, by Rag’n’Bone).

The Committee’s perfect record has however come to an end during 2017 Open held in Tunisia last fall. It became apparent very early that something was wrong with the Committee that day, since their early votes were unusually all over the place. And indeed, Ireland went on to win yet another contest, even though it has not scored any points from three Committee members: Canada, Estonia, Lithuania. This became the first documented case of Committee members not voting uniformly. Agger, Danish jury member and alleged Committee president, was not given much choice other than kicking out the three nations who violated the Committee’s codex.

Lithuania’s removal was considered to be the biggest shock of all. Along with Denmark and Italy, Lithuania was the only nation who have served the Committee on every previous TISC edition.

Generally speaking, not much is known about the Committee’s codex and organization, since barely anything is being shared with the outside World. Over the years, however, the Committee has grown to have mafia-alike reputation since there seems to be zero tolerance for not following the Committee’s instructions. Some rumors in fact suggest that Canadian, Estonian and Lithuanian Committee members who failed to deliver at the 2017 Open were punished by being thrown into the sea with cement shoes on. They were miraculously saved however by a group of unnamed individuals.

Newest part of the Committee saga has surfaced just recently, when Lithuanian former Committee member Werloc went public and exposed an alleged Committee’s secret recipe for the TISC victory.

The Committee has more to prove than ever before at the upcoming Jubilee to be held Saturday. With various scandals surfacing during the past few months, TISC fans will sure be following Committee’s every move.

Overall, 2018 Annual Jubilee edition will feature seven members of the Committee: Italy (vote #7), Iran (vote #8), Switzerland (vote #25), Denmark (vote #32), Norway (vote #34), Tunisia (#38) and Netherlands (vote #42). Committee additionally has 9 more members (AUS, CHI, HUN, LAT, MAR, TUR, UKR, URU, VIE), all of whom are inactive for this edition. Two debutants, Austria and Venezuela, meanwhile have an opportunity to join the Committee, if they award points to the new Jubilee Champion.

2018 Annual Committee Line-up