Spain in the Eurovision Song Contest 2010

In November 2009 Spanish national broadcaster RTVE announced its plans for the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest, which would be held in May 2010 in Oslo, Norway. The national campaign, ¡Tu país te necesita!, was launched by RTVE. As in the 2008 and 2009 Spanish selection processes the internet played a vital role in the selection, with all submitted entries placed on RTVE's website and voted upon for over two weeks. The ten most voted candidates proceeded to the televised final. Each voter was required to have a valid email address, and was able to vote only five times per day. RTVE reserved the right to subtract votes if it believed that fraudulent votes were being made by computer programs or scripts.[4][5][6] TVE insiders stated that the participation of joke entries, such as those found in previous contests like "Baila el Chiki Chiki", the winner of the 2008 Spanish national contest, would be avoided.[7]

Submissions for the internet voting began on 4 December 2010, and continued until 12 January 2010.[8][9] A total of 480 songs were submitted to RTVE for the contest,[10][11] of which 313 progressed to the online voting.[12]

During the voting period, from 18 January to 5 February 2010, 5,722,596 votes were registered, about 100,000 more votes than in 2009.[13]

On 21 January 2010, RTVE disqualified four songs from the online vote that were deemed to be breaking the rules of the competition. These included Pop Star Queen, who led the voting at the time of elimination; Chimo Bayo, who was in third place; Kejío; and Juan Losada.[14][15][16] On 2 February 2010, four further songs were disqualified: El Pezón Rojo, who were leading the online voting and were disqualified after it was revealed their song had been released in a podcast in 2008, along with Kito & Rafa, Rose Avalon and Sonia Monroy.[17][18]

The online voting ended on 5 February 2010.[19] On 8 February 2010, RTVE announced the finalised list of the 10 finalists after finalising all votes and removing falsified votes.[20][21]

On 22 February 2010, the ten online qualifiers competed again on the televised Eurovisión: Destino Oslo, which was held at TVE's Estudios Buñuel in Madrid and hosted by Anne Igartiburu and Ainhoa Arbizu, broadcast on TVE1 and online. The winner was decided by a combination of televoting (50%) and the votes from a jury (50%). The members of the jury were Manuel Bandera (actor), José María Íñigo (journalist), Toni Garrido (journalist), Mariola Orellana (music producer) and Pilar Tabares (radio presenter and director).

After the votes of the five jury members and the televote, Daniel Diges was declared the winner with his song "Algo pequeñito". He received 58 points from the jury, two points away from full marks, and full marks from the televoters, securing victory over Coral Segovia and Lorena, who came second and third respectively.[2][3]

A number of guest artists performed during the show, including Rosa López, Spanish Eurovision entrant in 2002, Sergio Dalma, Spanish Eurovision entrant in 1991, and David Bustamante, finalist in Operación Triunfo 2002, as well as a performance by the Spanish cast of the musical Chicago.[22][23][24]