Own USAvision Song Contest

The Own USAvision Song Contest, often shortened to OUSC is a song contest held on YouTube, primarily, among the member states of the Own Public Broadcasting Service since August 2020. The competition is based upon the existing Eurovision Song Contest which is held among the member countries of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) since 1956.

Each US States' head of delegation gets to select an entry for each edition either by internal or national selection. Then the states get to vote for each show (semi-final or final) to determine the qualifiers and the winner of the edition.

Origins
The first ever Own USAvision Song Contest started in September 2020. It was held in Los Angeles, California which also was the first nation to host the Own USAvision Song Contest, as well as the first direct qualifier to the final. 41 nations took part in the first edition each submitting one entry to the contest. Each state awarded 12 points to their favourite, 10 points to their second favourite, and then 8 to 1 points to the rest.

Participation
Any full member of the Own Public Broadcasting Service is allowed to send a song for the Own USAvision Song Contest. Each full member has got a certain broadcaster that is responsible for the choice of the artists and songs the state is sending for each edition. These will be listed here alongside the edition in which they made their debut:

Allocation Pots
The fifty-one US States are allocated into six pots, based on their geographical place and cultural similarities. Drawing from different pots helps in reducing the chance of so-called neighbour voting and increasing suspense in the semi-finals. The pots may vary each edition, depending of the Automatic Qualifiers, Returning or Withdrawing states.

Format
The contest's format was the same during the first editions; two semi-finals and a final were held. The top ten scored states from each semi-final advanced to the final. In the first edition, the host state was the sole automatic qualifier. However, for the next editions, this would change to big 6 and the top 6 from each edition will be a part of the big 6.

Autoqualifications
In the first edition, ABC7 broadcaster, the organizers of the first edition, announced that California would be auto-qualified to the final as it contributed in the organization of the contest. Since the second edition, the six highest-placed states in the grand final were guaranteed a place in the following edition's grand final, without having to qualify. The remaining states had to enter the semi-final.

Hosting
Since the very first edition the winning state of each edition is asked to be the host of the next edition.

Rules
There are several rules of the contest in order to enter. The main rule of the contest is that the State has to officially join the Own Public Broadcasting Service with a certain broadcaster before applying to enter the contest. Regarding the broadcaster, any broadcaster can be accepted by the OUSC. The head of delegation of the certain state must be at the position for at least three editions. If the head of delegation is not satisfied with the state, one can swap the states with other users. There are also rules regarding the entries, such as that Eurovision Song Contest songs are not allowed to compete in the contest or that the singer must be over the age of 16.
 * Main article: Rules

Voting
The voting system used in the contest has been in place since the beginning, and is a positional voting system. Each state awards one set of 12, 10, 8–1 points to their 10 favourite songs.

Presentation of votes
All the participating states have to vote in the final, including the states that failed to qualify from the semi-finals. From the first edition to the fourth edition the results were announced from last to first places, with the current announced entry being played. From the fifth edition onwards, it was decided to opt for a different system in which the individual scores of the finalist states are shown (12 to 1) and a second round proceeds in which the points of a televote (made up of the semi-finalists) are added up using the ranking of the previous part.

Nul points and ties
So far there has been no entry with a final result of no points from any state.

There have been several ties during the contest. In case of a tie between two or more states, the state that received points from the most states wins the tie. However, if the states received points from the same number of states, the number of 12 points is counted and if they are still tied it goes on until the tie breaks.

Winners
The contest has so far 8 winning states.

Own USAvision Song Contest Winners Edition 1
Own USAvision Song Contest Winners Edition 1 is an upcoming event organized to determine the Own USAvision Song Contest's most popular entrant in the last ten edition, respectively Own USAvision Song Contest 1 to Own USAvision Song Contest 10.