AINVision New Duveland 2017

AINVision New Duveland 2017 is the 14th semi-annual AINVision Song Contest, which will take place in New Duveland after they successfully won the hosting rights after placing first in AINVision Winter 2017, making it the first time the contest will be hosted in the country.

The event will take place in Plymouth's Convention & Exhibition Centre, which is located along the city's waterfront with immediate connections to the central business district and numerous public transportation options.

Location
The host city, Plymouth, was announced on the 29th of June, 2017 within a brief announcement containing all crucial event times. The venue was also announced to be the Plymouth Convention & Exhibition Centre, which will house a temporary capacity of upwards of 30,000 from it's usual 15,000. It was this expansive room that had the final sway against the next in line competitor, Toulon.

Selection had been confirmed early on in 2017 to be one of New Duveland's "Little Big Cities", as the national tourism campaign and the New Duveland Government is trying to let the cities of Cascade, Leinster, Plymouth and Toulon share the spotlight with Tasbury, Esperance and Loisieux, the three largest destinations for international arrivals in the country.

Host City
Plymouth is the capital and largest city of Tasman, and also the fifth most populous city in New Duveland, with a population of 1.2 million in the greater metropolitan area. Founded in 1833 as a free settlement, the city was named after Plymouth, in the United Kingdom. The central business district lies on the edge of the Plymouth Harbour, a sunken valley that travels some 15km inland. The city itself has a significant geographic advantage over any other city in the running, as it is located right in the middle between the two most populous cities in the country, Tasbury and Esperance. This strategic advantage has seen it become the fastest growing city in the country, and under current predictions, will overtake Toulon to become the 4th largest city as early as 2025.

City Park, the largest stadium in the city with a normal capacity of 51,005, can be retrofited to fit an additional 15,000 people. The stadium has an operable roof, making it available to use as a host venue under the AINVision regulations that a venue must have a roof. Likewise to the Norfolk Rua Whenua Stadium, City Park sold out numerous times during the recent Alliance World Cup.

City Park was delisted from potential venues due to it only having a partially covered roof. The Plymouth Convention & Exhibition Centre is also expected to be shortlisted as one of the bidding venues. The building is 450 metres in length, 120 m wide and 24 m high. The complex roof design is based on five hyperbolic paraboloids. The building is stabilised by concrete shear walls and clad in steel. A car park is located on the ground floor. The capacity, when combining the main Theatre seating, can reach upwards of 30,000.

The PCEC was recently upgraded and expanded in 2010, it cost $150 million and was funded by the Tasman Government. The five-level expansion has 25,000m² of floorspace and includes two auditoria for 400 and 600 with accompanying foyer space, speakers’ facilities, and private boardrooms.

Cascade
Cascade is the capital and most populous city in the Province of Norfolk, and is the second least populated provincial capital in New Duveland. Founded in 1798 as a penal colony, it is New Duveland's second oldest capital city after Macquarie.

The city is located on the western coast of Rua Whenua, the second largest island in New Duveland, on the banks of the Hosier River and the Rawe Harbour. It is surrounded by lush vegetation full of native Norfolk Pine, one of the Provinces, and national emblems.

The city itself hosts a large range of stadiums and structures that are adequate to host large crowds, such as AINVision. The most notable being the Norfolk Rua Whenua Stadium, which played host to several matches in the 2017 AFA Alliance World Cup, and completely sold out to seat a maximum 45,000 on 3 occasions.

Cascade's relatively low population and isolation compared to other competing cities draws it back in some aspects. Being on an island away from the main areas of population make it much more tedious to travel to for international arrivals, as currently the only way to reach the city internationally is via Tasbury or Esperance.

It was revealed that due to the reasons listed above, Cascade has been ruled out as a potential candidate city.

Leinster
Leinster is the capital and most populous city in New Ulster and the third most populous city in New Duveland. Leinster's metropolitan area has a population of just over 2 million. The city lays on the original European settlement on the banks of the McKenzie River, about 10 kilometres (6 miles) from its mouth at Kore Matau Bay. The metropolitan area extends in all directions along the floodplain of the McKenzie River between Kore Matau Bay and the foothills of the Great Tasman Range. Before the suburban sprawl merged with coastal towns along the shore of Kore Matau Bay, it was considered the largest inland city in New Duveland, however the title has since been given to Toulon.

Being a much larger, world city, Leinster hosts numerous venues and stadiums adequate to hosting large crowds. The city's largest stadium, Irish Park has previously been used as concert grounds, although rarely as the sports seasons often don't allow for extended period of times without the use of their home stadium. The stadium is the home ground for the Leinster Leprechauns (Rugby Union) and the New Ulster Harps (Rugby Union) clubs.

The Nua Éire Arena, used for national tennis matches, would be a more suitable stadium as it is regularly used for concerts, although can only hold up to 40,000 people, and has previously hosted hundreds of different conerts and performers, such as Lady Gaga, Green Day and Justin Timberlake.

Toulon
Toulon is the capital and most populous city of New Hérault, and the fourth largest city in New Duveland. The city was founded on the banks of the Devereaux River, the largest and most navigable river in New Duveland and was founded in 1814, making it one of the oldest cities in New Duveland. The city was named after Toulon, France, from where the first settlers first departed.

Toulon was founded as a free settlement under the French Empire, although it's development for much of the 19th and 20th century was slow due to it being in the same territory as Esperance, which was the capital of the Realm of Lapérouse at the time. Most of the region's resources were sent to Esperance, causing Toulon to struggle to develop economically and only really started to develop significantly after the 1963 unification with New Duveland. This saw the creation of the New Hérault province, allowing the city to flourish with unlimited access to it's own resources.

Stade de Nouveau Hérault, the main stadium of the city can seat just over 56,000 people. It's main feature is the operable roof, one of the largest in New Duveland. The stadium is home to New Hérault's provincial Cricket team, the the Toulon Tigers (Rugby Union) and the Toulon Giants (Rugby League). It also played a large part in the Alliance World Cup, hosting the Semi-finals between Neu Westfalen and Cattala.

Corporate sponsorship
- AlpAir - Air New Duveland - AeroWestfalica - Bank of Zambezi - Bank of Americanity - Blume Technology Corporation - Breda - BSC (Bank of Sint Cunera) - CARTERrail - Coop Siculia - Diamantina Dairy Co. - Genter

- Halotel - Industrial Illusion - IRCA - Jarraban Airways - Kiyora - Lindt & Sprüngli - Lapérouse Airways - Lapérouse Bank - MIGROS - MRA - Multicredit Bank - Network Two

- New Duveland National Bank - Sasaki Indutries - Setsu Electrical Co. Ltd - Siculia Airlines - Siculia Financial - Tassoni - Union Banking & Insurances - Visit Cunera - Voss Inc - Watsons Publishing - Wilfranese Broadcasting Corporation - ZamAir

Presenter
The presenter for this installment is confirmed to be Carrie Bickmore, a TV talk show and current affairs Gold Logie award-winning television and radio presenter and host of the last season of So You Think You Can Dance New Duveland.

Bickmore was born in Cascade, Norfolk, on the 3rd of December 1980, but was shortly moved with the family to Toulon a year later, where she spent most of her growing life. She studied journalism at Saint-Mandrier University of Technology from 1998 to 2000, and soon after moved to Tasbury to pursue a career in media. Her career started on the radio 72.7FM in Toulon where she began as an emergency fill-in for a sick colleague. After this she was appointed as a regular newsreader for the station. In 2001, she became the afternoon newsreader for Tasbury's radio station Waiata 100 and in 2002 she became co-host of Waiata's drive show.

Her Career took a turn when she was offered a role as one of the main Presenters on the news-current affairs television panel program, Tonight, in 2009. She has stayed as one of the last remaining hosts, even when considering the show is thriving as the most popular current affairs show in New Duveland.

Intermission Acts
Throughout both the Final Performance and Voting period, there were a series of intermission acts that split the performance into 3 slots. On the performance night, there was a heavy theme of past acts that represented New Duveland since it's debut, including Guy Sebastian, Gabriella Cilmi and Samantha Jade. Other iconic New Duvelander artists such as the Birds of Tokyo, The Veronicas, Dean Ray, Sheppard, and Thirsty Merc also played during the intermission times, representing the current and past trends of the music scene in the country.

During the life results, performers such as Dami Im, The Temper Trap, Peking Duk, That Poppy, Vance Joy, and Stromae performed, which are just some of the most popular artists in New Duveland during the hosting period.

All the intermission acts were selected by the New Duveland public in online social media polls during the early stages of development, thus getting the true feel of what New Duveland has offered the world through it's music industry.

Participating countries
As hosts, New Duveland were required to participate in the contest. The number of nations participating in this season's contest reach a high of 21, which hasn't been seen since the early days of AINVision, and became the 2nd most expansive AINVision, equal to Kingston and Boyce's AINVision Winter 2013.

Not only did the event see seven new nations made their debut, including Acadia, Amuria, Caravella-Guatalaga, Nakama, Sint Cunera, Wilfran and Rapha, and Zambezi, but also to return of Okatabawashi and Karasem.

Although the event did see a significant fallout of previous AINVision giants such as Illium, the Atlantic Federation, and Hiigara, although their absence was missed, it definitely didn't dampen the show.

Results
Results were initially delayed a week due to late voting by several member states, the event was broadcast in the early hours of Saturday the 2nd of September, 2017.

This is the first time that a host nation has won the tournament themselves after winning the prior competition. (Kingston & Boyce has hosted twice in a row, but only by default when St. Croix's event was cancelled)

Interestingly, as opposed to all previous AINVision winners, New Duveland did not receive a single 12 points from any nation, but had instead received points from 18 of the other 20 competing nations.

Spokespeople
Valery Baskovsky TBA Amelie Latour Camila Cabello László Tolcsvay Ferydoon Zandi Chris Liew

Deddy Mahendra Desta Rebecca Redd Stefen Brunke Kayano Ai Simon Hester Sean Thompson Alyson Hau

Jenn Johnson Mário Motta Jullian Jandino Paolo De Luca Takuya Kusakawa Tiago Leifert Vanessa Mdee