Yleisradio Oy, translated to English as the Finnish Broadcasting Company, is Finland's national public broadcasting company, founded in 1926. It is a joint-stock company which is 99.98% owned by the Finnish state, and employs around 3,200 people in Finland. Yle shares many of its organizational characteristics with its UK counterpart, the BBC, on which it was largely modelled.
MTV3 is a Finnish commercial television station. It had the biggest audience share of all Finnish TV channels until Yle TV1 took the lead. The letters MTV stand for Mainos-TV, due to the channel carrying advertising for revenue. Number 3 was added later, when the channel was allocated the third nationwide television channel and it generally became known as "Channel Three"—Finnish Broadcasting Company’s Yle TV1 and Yle TV2 being the first two—and also to distinguish it from the later MTV Finland, which is a Finnish version of ViacomCBS's MTV channel. From 1957 until 2001, the channel's logo was a stylised owl, changed to an owl's eye after an image renewal in 2001, which was then used until 2013. MTV3 has about 500 employees. It is also known as Maikkari.
Television was introduced in Finland in 1955. Color television started in 1971. Prior to 1986, Yle monopolized Finnish television. All terrestrial analogue stations stopped broadcasting on 1 September 2007 after the introduction of digital television; cable providers were allowed to continue analog broadcasting in their networks until 1 March 2008.
SVT World was an international television channel from the Swedish broadcaster Sveriges Television. The channel was available on satellite in Europe and much of Africa, Australia and Asia, terrestrially in parts of Finland and worldwide via IPTV.
Julmahuvi is the name of a group of comedic actors which created several comical TV-series and mockumentaries for the Finnish TV-channels Yle TV1 and MTV3. Julmahuvi collectively are Tommi Korpela, Jukka Rasila, Janne Reinikainen, Petteri Summanen and Jani Volanen.
Roman Schatz is a German-born Finnish journalist and author. He has written more than two dozen books, many of which have also been published in Germany. His first book was called From Finland with love – Suomesta rakkaudella.
Sauli Eerik Koskinen is a Finnish television host and entertainment reporter from Hyvinkää, Finland.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2012 with the song "När jag blundar" written by Jonas Karlsson. The song was performed by Pernilla Karlsson. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2012 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2012 contest in Baku, Azerbaijan. 13 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of four performance shows and a final, taking place in January and February 2012. Six entries ultimately competed in the final on 25 February where votes from the public selected "När jag blundar" performed by Pernilla Karlsson as the winner.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 with the song "Marry Me" written by Krista Siegfrids, Erik Nyholm, Kristofer Karlsson and Jessika Lundström. The song was performed by Krista Siegfrids. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2013 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2013 contest in Malmö, Sweden. 12 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of two heats, a semi-final and a final, taking place in January and February 2013. Eight entries ultimately competed in the final on 9 February where the 50/50 combination of votes from a four-member judging panel and votes from the public selected "Marry Me" performed by Krista Siegfrids as the winner.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 with the song "Something Better" written by Topi Latukka and Henri Oskár. The song was performed by the band Softengine. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2014 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2014 contest in Copenhagen, Denmark. 12 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of two heats, a semi-final and a final, taking place in January and February 2014. Eight entries ultimately competed in the final on 1 February where the 50/50 combination of votes from a four-member judging panel and votes from the public selected "Something Better" performed by Softengine as the winner.
Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu is an annual music contest organised by the Finnish public broadcaster Yle. UMK began in 2012 as a new concept for the Finnish selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, replacing the original Finnish Eurovision Song Contest qualifying event which had been held since 1961.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2015 with the song "Aina mun pitää" written and performed by the band Pertti Kurikan Nimipäivät. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2015 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2015 contest in Vienna, Austria. 18 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of three semi-finals and a final, taking place in February 2015. Six entries competed in each semi-final and the top three from each semi-final, as selected solely by a public vote, advanced to the final. Nine entries competed in the final on 28 February where the combination of votes from eight jury groups representing different factions of Finnish society and votes from the public selected "Aina mun pitää" performed by Pertti Kurikan Nimipäivät as the winner.
Ismo Mikael Leikola, sometimes known professionally as ISMO, is a Finnish stand-up comedian, musician, author, screenwriter, and YouTuber. Leikola made his United States debut in 2014, when he was awarded the title of "The Funniest Person in the World" in a contest organized by the comedy club Laugh Factory. In 2015, he made comedy series ISMO for Finnish television and moved to the United States. He became an internationally known stand-up comedian after his performance on the Conan talk show in 2018 and has since toured internationally.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 with the song "Sing It Away" written by Sandhja Kuivalainen, Milos Rosas, Heikki Korhonen, Petri Matara and Markus Savijoki. The song was performed by Sandhja. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2016 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2016 contest in Stockholm, Sweden. 18 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of three semi-finals and a final, taking place in February 2016. Six entries competed in each semi-final and the top three from each semi-final, as selected solely by a public vote, advanced to the final. Nine entries competed in the final on 27 February where the 50/50 combination of votes from ten jury groups representing different factions of Finnish society and votes from the public selected "Sing It Away" performed by Sandhja as the winner.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 with the song "Blackbird" written and performed by Lasse Piirainen and Leena Tirronen under the name Norma John. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2017 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2017 contest in Kyiv, Ukraine. Ten entries were selected to compete in the national final on 28 January 2017 where the 50/50 combination of votes from ten international jury groups and votes from the public selected "Blackbird" performed by Norma John as the winner.
Yle Teema & Fem is a Finnish free-to-air television channel owned by Finnish state-broadcaster Yle. It was launched on 24 April 2017, after Yle Teema and Yle Fem merged to this channel.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 with the song "Look Away" written and performed by Ville Virtanen under the stage name Darude and Sebastian Rejman. Darude and Sebastian Rejman were internally selected by the Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) in January 2019 to represent the nation at the 2019 contest in Tel Aviv, Israel. The national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2019 was organised in order to select the song that Darude and Rejman would perform. Three songs were selected to compete in the national final on 2 March 2019 where the 50/50 combination of votes from eight international jury groups and votes from the public selected "Monsters" as the winning song.
National selections refer to the processes in which the broadcasters of the countries participating in the annual Eurovision Song Contest select the artist and song that will represent them in the contest.
Finland originally planned to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 with the song "Looking Back" written by Joonas Angeria, Whitney Phillips, Connor McDonough, Riley McDonough and Toby McDonough. The song was performed by Aksel Kankaanranta. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2020 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2020 contest in Rotterdam, Netherlands. Six entries were selected to compete in the national final on 7 March 2020 where the 50/50 combination of votes from eight international jury groups and votes from the public selected "Looking Back" performed by Aksel Kankaanranta as the winner.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 with the song "Dark Side" written by Aleksi Kaunisvesi, Joonas Porko, Joel Hokka, Niko Moilanen and Olli Matela. The song was performed by the band Blind Channel. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu 2021 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2021 contest in Rotterdam, Netherlands. Seven entries were selected to compete in the national final on 20 February 2021 where the combination of votes from seven international jury groups and votes from the public selected "Dark Side" performed by Blind Channel as the winner.
