What do you think of it so far?

Its a week to go to the end of the 2012 CBB as I write this. What have we learned from our frugal allowance of contact and information? The show continues to exist in two places which are interconnected by some very small and regulated tunnels of information exchange.

From Borehamwood, the nightly show continues its heavily structured way through the week.  BBOTS staggers from evening to evening with its random mix of generally irritating and occasionally informative guests.  Emma enjoys herself, which she does well; and Jamie irritates most people, but that may be his forte.  We have been allocated some Live feed after evictions. Not a lot, but some at least.  That is what comes our way via TV.

Social media - specifically Facebook and and Twitter are unmitigated drivel.  The video clips linked back though Facebook are pointless.  The topics in FB and the Tweets are so pathetic it would be funny if it were not for the fact that very well paid and powerful people allegedly believe it is a good idea and a valid replacement for what the fans actually want.  The newspapers and magazines owned by Desmond cover the programme, but few people read them. The other papers and magazines largely ignore it.

The other place the show exists is in the fan community. The fans are held together by two things, the love of the show and the desire to persuade Desmond and his patronising team that we are right and he is wrong.  The fan base that the show has generated for years continues on forums and chat rooms but the information paucity has led to a significant drop in the amount of 'water cooler' chats and office discussions that increased the viewer numbers in years gone by.

So, what have we discussed and what have we learned?
Firstly we have discussed the absence of real Live Feed which is seen as an unwelcome opportunity for the production team to be dishonest and manipulative of story-lines shown. The subject of Live Feed has not gone away regardless of Channel 5 and the attempts of Jamie East to belittle anyone who brought the subject up on his BBOTS segment.  Jamie has said since that it was an attempt at humour but if true he lacks the comedic touch in some matters.  Generally speaking asking someone their opinion on something and then hanging up when they respond is considered bad manners.  Live feed  has obtained the largest figures ever for 5* and beat the viewer figures for BBOTS.  The numbers (not far short of a million) were achieved despite the miniscule length of the broadcasts.  The segments were also broadcast right after evictions, a time when the HMs are normally principally concerned with getting out into the garden to smoke.

The mix of Housemates was eclectic to say the least. The claims of Natasha, Frankie and Andrew to any kind of celebrity status are not strong - they (especially Frankie) were plainly out of their depth.
There did not seem to be a significant USA/UK divide except at the level of game play.  The twins by virtue of who they are and their background were absolutely determined to play the game US style and did it very well.  They know well that their price in the market place is determined by what they do and what they reveal (or don't).  The twins were conspiratorial, devious and Machiavellian at times and kept enough clothes on to preserve their market value.  I never warmed to them and they are unlikely to win but good game Kristina and Karissa.
Michael Madsen was rightly held in awe by the rest of the HMs.  He is the only real celebrity in the house and I hope his fee reflects that. He (with his supporting actors) supplied much of the entertainment. Good game Michael.
Nicola was exactly as we imagined her to be, shrewd, grasping and self centred. Whether cleaning the house to get air time, weeping over the children she chose to leave behind, playing to the cameras in the DR or shredding the other HM's letters from home it was all about her.  She won't win but she played well for her moment in the spotlight.
Denise revealed herself to be a truly troubled soul as her background suggests she is.  She was foolish to get involved in the show. Romeo came across well whenever we got to see him. Gareth is the likely winner and has been since day one. Kirk was fairly unpleasant and slightly ugly of spirit, and Georgia was pleasant and pretty of face. Perhaps there was more to them, perhaps not.
Natalie has probably done herself not too much harm by going in.  Her alliances in the house may have cost her a place on the final eviction night.

Housemates' standards of behaviour seem far lower. For example, in the last series we were belatedly given the information about 'Freezergate'. We found out only because the efforts of C5 and Jamie East to silence Heaven were not successful.  In this series Denise certainly raised her fist in Michael's face, which would have been threatening behaviour when C4 ran the show. The show may be above reproach, or it could be as unsavoury as BB Brazil, we will never know.  In Brazil it was Live feed which enabled the production team to be belatedly held to task. Possibly under C5 management, external scrutiny is to be avoided. Certainly Richard Desmond has no intention of subjecting his newspapers to Press Complaints Council scrutiny either.
Poor behaviour is also amplified by another change under the C5 stewardship - the shopping budget task which is now a farce.  It is futile to pretend that there is any intention of not supplying food and alcoholic drinks to the HMs every single night.  There is no doubt in my mind that the aim of the production team is to ensure that there is every chance of drunken frolics every night, for there is not much frolicking with tired HMs on a diet of water and chick peas. However the stark warning of BB Brazil should be kept in the minds of the team.  And of course, alcohol does not only lead to chance sexual encounters, it also leads to verbal violence and possibly physical violence as well.  BB UK has certainly had some examples yet they persist in pouring endless drink into the HMs .  The overtly sexual behaviour of Frankie and Kirk was unpleasant and it was well dealt with by the females targeted.  Perhaps Kirk will eventually learn that laying around being verbally offensive while scratching his genitals is unlikely to win the hearts of fair maidens even if in the world of TOWIE it is socially acceptable.

Voting and evictions seemed to raise peoples interest as always. Friday's double evictions of Kirk and Natalie had an overtone of Harry's eviction last series and the ever present spectre of FaceBook enabling voting scams is again in people's minds.  It seemed the ideal time for someone to make some money by betting shrewdly. There were lots of people up as well - more than the 4 when Harry got the unexpected boot despite being 33/1. Perhaps last night's eviction was an aberration - but it was certainly an ideal time for an unexpected result perhaps because Natalie was about 3rd or 4th favourite to win.
It would be an understatement to say that surprise was expressed within the house and outside as well when Natalie went.  So voting is still under suspicion and it remains blatantly unfair that phone voters pay more than 5 times the price of Facebook users anyway.  It may have been designed to encourage Facebook 'social media interaction' but in reality Facebook users are Facebook users and phone users are phone users. The only likely effect is that phone users will feel even less inclined to vote because of dissatisfaction with the Facebook discount. It will be interesting to see the voting percentages when they are released to see if there is a change in the Facebook/phone ratio.
If I was of a suspicious mindset I would have said that Friday night's eviction was the one good chance they would get for a 'surprise' outcome in this series. Before now its been 1 v 1, and after now its running totals till the end.
Perhaps Natalie was a result of a shrewd bet and some good information on how the totals were standing and the very useful FaceBook block voting.
Perhaps we will never know.

What do we think of it so far then?
CBB is seen as a holiday camp - with free food and free booze aplenty.  Fans are generally opposed to talking about nominations although it is popular with the housemates to a point.  BB have certainly used it to their advantage this series - a rare well done C5, but its not BB as we know it.  There is something of the night in all of Desmond's doings. There seems little doubt that they have a view about who they want to win but I don't know if they can control it anymore having let the genie out of the bottle with FaceBook voting.  Desmond (Northern and Shell) is wholly about control and money - nothing else.  I am sure he would like the LF money but his production team does not dare to risk losing control of story lines and outcomes.  Even though Mr Desmond's newspapers are not subject to the Press Complaints Council (because he has withdrawn them) I suspect he does not want another Shetty shambles on his TV channels.

Perhaps Live Feed will make or break the next series.
Perhaps we are deluded in our attempts to change the programme back to what it could be and should be.  Certainly we have not 'moved on'.  The sad thing for Channel 5 is that we are right (and we and they know it) and they are wrong.  The sad thing for us is that there is no real way that the Channel 5 owners and the BB production team are likely to have the balls to admit who is right and do something about it.  Live Feed please BB.  Not 45 minutes once an eviction BB.  Live Feed means that; as near to 24/7 as you can manage.  Then we will shut up.  And if you would like to make the Social Media just an add on like it is in other countries that would be good.  And if you were honest and did not cover things up we could believe you so that would be good too.  And if someone has a valid point to make on Facebook and you disagree with it the correct response is to put your side - not delete the comments and block the poster. 
Overall your tasks were a pretty good in places.  Some of your Big Brothers were good.  It does not have to be totally frenetic 24/7 to get us on-side.   We like the longer tasks with real rewards or deprivation.  We don't mind the quiet times and the conversations.  And finally remember, we are the most loyal audience you could ever wish for but perhaps you would be well advised to have us inside the BB tent pissing out and not outside it pissing in.

Voting for a change on BB

I am indebted to http://www.bigbrotherxtra.co.uk/?p=2639  for the following:

"Some 1.5 million votes were cast during nine weeks of Big Brother, 47 per cent of which were through the Big Brother Facebook app.

Channel 5 received around 500,000 votes for Celebrity Big Brother through its telephone services.

Big Brother contributed to a 25 per cent boost in Channel 5′s evening audience while it was on air.

Nick Bampton, the commercial sales director at Channel 5, said: “We took a risk in changing the voting mechanism. Integrating Facebook is a UK first and we’re pleased it has generated a substantial uplift in votes cast.” **"

CBB is only of passing interest.  500,000 votes at 36pence = £180,000 for 3 weeks voting (although the take for C5 may well be a bit less).  BB is a bit more interesting to conspiracy theorists though.

• BB ran for 9 weeks during which time there were 15 housemates (2 of whom walked out).

• 12 were voted out (8 on a weekly vote and 4 on the last night) leaving Aaron the worthy or unworthy winner depending on which camp you belonged to.  The votes were reopened after each eviction on Final night and after the mid week eviction in week 9.

• Viewer numbers were normally below 2 million and generally at 1 million or less.

• Effectively then, viewers and FB voters got to vote for 12 evictions.  They are never going to release the total numbers cast per eviction so I will assume that they were constant.

• Figures for phone votes for the whole series (53% of 1.5 million) = 795000

• Figures for FB votes for the whole series (47% of 1.5 million) =705000

• The total money spent by viewers and FB voters was probably as low as:
  Phone £286200 (795000 x £0.36) + FB  £49350 (705000 x £0.07) (the lowest cost of FB votes was 10 cents or 7p)

Gives a grand total of £335,550, although not all that cash was going C5's way.

You could of course block vote FB credits to the total of 500 per week. Interestingly enough, that total of FB votes (705k) could be achieved by only 1410 bloke votes of the maximum permitted per week. Also of interest is the fact that FB votes brought in about 1 sixth of the vote revenue.

If the votes were spread evenly across all 12 evictions (unlikely, but we have to make a few assumptions if they won't tell us anything), then each eviction received (1.5 million/12 = 125,000) votes of which 66,250 were on the phone and 58,750 were on FB.

Try this for a conspiracy imagination:

Imagine that it was a four way eviction like the one when Harry (33/1) got evicted. Imagine also that it is fairly neck and neck so that each nominated housemate has exactly the same number of votes. Perhaps the total votes cast so far by 5pm Friday evening was 100,000 so each of them had 25000 votes each.  How much would have to be spent to get Harry out the door?
Well, it was vote to save so to get to the average vote of 125,000 another 25000 votes would have to be cast for the other 3 contestants which in FB terms is 50 Block FB votes delivered by 50 different accounts.  Total cost to the FB block voters (whoever they may be) is only £1400.

If you were a gambler attracted by the 33 to 1 odds on Harry being evicted you would only have to wager £42.42 to recoup that outlay if he was evicted.

Of course, you would need to know that the voting numbers were so low that you could 'invest' in FB block votes to the extent that you could change the outcome.  Perhaps you would need someone who had access to the voting totals?

The only really unanswered question in this for me is why are C5 persisting with this block vote, low cost, low profit option? It leaves them open to all sorts of conspiracy theorists like me.  And if it isn't a dark conspiracy then it does have the faint whiff of incompetence - rather like the whole series.

** It is difficult to judge where Nick Bampton gets his confidence in FB voting from.  It registered about 700k votes but it is hard to judge what impact that had on phone voting.

Big Brother ends and the battle continues

Mission Statement:

I will continue the battle for Live Feed even though the show has finished (in what may be best described as an unusual manner.) Perhaps a fitting end to a shabby version of something that was once far, far better.
It started with falsehoods from C5 about what they would offer and descended into acrimony and mutual suspicion as they attempted to stifle all dissent.  The manipulation of all the highlight shows was apparent and served only to annoy the voters.  Aaron was the winner.  He had a large fan base and an equally large and vociferous opposition.

As long as I can I will chase them and harangue them and point out their failings to anyone who will listen.

There have been some good recent articles about BB. 

My first choice is from Kit Marsters.

Kit Marsters at the Huffy Post - Big Brother On Channel 5 - Does It Have A Future?

My second choice is from a fan site.

BBSpy Big Brother 2011 in review

After a night's reflection it seems likely that this was not the result that Channel 5 BB wanted or planned for. It seems that BB did not want him to win but would have preferred one of the two young ladies who had already shown a fair deal of their specific 'talents' in other activities on the web.  Failing a girl win they might have liked Jay to be the face of Ibiza themed BB going forward.  Certainly not metrosexual Aaron.  His ability to think and speak was probably not the asset they wanted as their brand leader. They showed him as badly as they could all the way through.  If he had sought solace by shitting in the freezer it surely would have been a special Highlights show all of its own.

They sought control of everything all the way through and in the end they could not control the combined power of the social media, block votes, fan groups (& gamblers attracted by a nice pay day.)

It is really ironic that the very activity that they thought would help them flog their shabby product turned round and bit them. I take heart from their discomfort.  Perhaps now they see that control and rent-a-mob is not how BB worked and should work.   BB has always been about viewer participation; no viewers, no show C5.

Telegraph & the FB Rape pages - a useful example for us?

Telegraph & the FB Rape pages
There was a story today in the Telegraph.
This section caught my eye.

Campaigners on both sides of the Atlantic have now switched their attention to businesses as they believe Facebook is inclined to allow the pages to continue because of the viewers and hence advertising revenue they bring in.

"Facebook will only listen to money, so we are now targeting the advertisers who have appeared on their pages,"[..........]"We are delighted with the response of companies like John Lewis that pulled their ads."

Major companies that advertise on Facebook were furious to discover that their advertisements were appearing on the "rape page" and demanded they be removed. They included Barclays, 02, John Lewis, Sony, BlackBerry, American Express, Groupon, Heinz, National Lottery, the White Company and PepsiCo.

After complaints from several businesses to Facebook, the "alleyway" page was "whitelisted" last week, meaning that no adverts could be rotated on it.

Why is this a useful example?
It tells us that Facebook don't really care what people think.  We can pester OBB as much as possible, they are managing the situation between them (Ch5 & FB) as this weekends' cull proves.  If FB can allow this loathsome page (and similar) to exist, us moaning about OBB tactics won't cause them any lost sleep.

What do FB care about?
Money.  How does that help us?  No posting, no advertisers, no FB.

Will the OBB campaign bear any fruit?
Only if there is publicity.  The press have had 5 weeks to pick up on it; it is not generating many column inches.

How do we get publicity?
We need to stop writing on the wall and write to the sponsors.  All that is happening is that profiles are being removed as fast as they are created.  Very soul destroying and effort wasting.

Campaign steps?
We need to bring our list of key players (advertisers and major execs involved in various decisions) up to date and push now.

Why now?
Because BB are increasingly vulnerable as viewing figures are falling.  Voting may bring revenue to the table for Ch5 (if there is any voting)  but unless there is a sizeable audience the advertisers wont want to pay.

'Accidental' Facebook Account Suspension Claims

You may have seen adverts similar to this on the media.

If you've been suspended by Facebook since Big Brother started and it wasn't your fault, the Facebook Accidental Suspension Helpline can probably help you claim, why not find out?

Facebook Accidental Suspension Helpline is the UK's leading name in Facebook claims.

Thinking of making a claim due to an suspension that wasn't your fault? If so, you may be entitled to compensation, and the Facebook Accidental Suspension Helpline™ are here to guide you through the claims process. In the past , we’ve helped tens of thousands of people across the UK (well some anyway) make compensation claims for their accidental suspension - compensation they deserved.

Account Suspension can happen at any time. Many suspensions occur on the OBB, involving simpletons and mods or paid lackeys.

Why make an Accidental Suspension claim?
Victims of more serious suspensions regularly need time off Facebook to recover from their suspension, leading to credibility problems such as struggling to keep up with games and their crops dying. In fact, many people return to Facebook too early due to these problems. That is why it is important that Accidental Suspension victims make an Accidental Suspension Claim and are awarded the compensation they deserve - to give them the time needed to make a full recovery.

We can make an Accidental Suspension Claim if it can be shown that someone in FB or BB has been at fault in some way - that they have failed in a duty or not taken reasonable care - and that this fault or failure caused (or partly caused) the suspension or that the suspension was instigated or encouraged by the Channel 5 employees or their supporters on the Official Big Brother site and carried out by Facebook.

There are reported instances of Facebook suspending accounts and when challenged backing down and admitting they made a mistake.  This suggests that the suspension is not a random occurrence  but a targeted selection of an individual, probably from the Official Big Brother Wall as this seems to be a linking feature.  The likeliest sequence of events if that someone on the OBB wall is reporting people that they do not agree with and claiming that they are fake profiles.  The speed with which Facebook is now backing down suggests that they have had some practice.  If they cause you inconvenience by suspending your account you should be entitled to compensation, not some feeble apology in an email.


How about it Facebook?  
Is it time to stop the suspensions and more emails saying that you have made more mistakes?
Is it time to identify the individual or individuals who are instigating this process and suspend them instead?
Or is it time to pay compensation? 
I am sure the ambulance chasers would love a new group of clients.

Just a little note about a big inconvenience & some selling out

The Inconvenience.
The new OBB tactic is to target Live Feeders by reporting them as Fake.  The sycophantic Facebook team, who cannot bring themselves to take down a Facebook page that tells jokes about rape, have no hesitation in blocking the profiles of the Live Feeders for asking for something sensible on the OBB site.  I am not sure who comes out of this smelling more like the contents of Jay's cigarette packet in the freezer; Official Big Brother or Facebook.  Neither of them are covering themselves with glory though.

Selling out. 

Some of the stalwarts on Twitter who have been fighting for Live Feed seem to have changed their tune. BB_Superfan for example has been a key player on the Twitter Live Feed campaign for the last month but now has now decided to give BB a chance.  Nikki Cowan who was treated very badly by Big Brother for mentioning Live Feed on BOTS is now welcomed back into their arms.   I have asked him if he is back in again.  I await his response.

I saw this post on Facebook: 


"Two of my Twitter chums received DMs purportedly from you-know-who suggesting they ought to consider being housemates, as they clearly have the requisite qualities"

 If this is fact it suggests that Big Brother are willing to 'buy off' the opposition with worthless offers of being a future housemate *LOL*.

What does it tell us if these rumours are true? 
I think it was in Calvin and Hobbes that our stripy hero said that "I don't know which is worse...that everyone has his price, or that the price is always so low.." (The Days Are Just Packed p56 (08 Apr 92) )

The OBB Mods seem to have blocked every feeder last night (12/10/11).  I know I mentioned that this was their intention in my last blog but it still comes as a shock when it happened.  Another little inconvenience.

In summary then.  Buy off (cheaply) as many people as you can (people who may have a following) then block the rest.

The battle lines are drawn up - CH5 & FB versus decent people

The following represents my recollections of a month of Facebook conflict (and this weekend's hostilities) and my interpretation of what has occurred behind the scenes.  I know more of the actions of the Live Feeders because I am one.  I also know more of the Live Feeder's discussions than are mentioned below.

The area for fighting against Channel 5 appears to be Facebook at the moment.
Rightfully it should be on the desks of newspapers and magazines, and on the desks of the advertisers.  I am sure that the written media (both paper based and on the Web - excluding the Northern & Shell titles of course) would be anxious to have a good story that showed Channel 5, Big Brother and/or Northern & Shell publications in a poor light.
The advertisers need to have a real understanding that their potential market place is far smaller than it would be if the programme we were watching was similar to the one which has traditionally been provided by Endemol and Channel 4 (especially if it was in the style provided before Channel 4 lost their nerve). The beginning of Channel 5's involvement with Facebook coincided with a cull of many accounts by Facebook.  Some of them were previously involved in Big Brother on Facebook.  For many accounts the choice presented by Facebook was simple: trust us with your photo ID or cell phone number or your account remains blocked.  For many people this was something they never wished to do.

The Sides
On the one side you have Channel 5 and Facebook who have formed a group with linked interests, common purpose and financial agreements.  On the other those people who think that Channel 4 did a better job of Big Brother than Channel 5 (the so-called Live Feeders).  The place chosen for conflict is the Official Big Brother Wall on Facebook (OBB).

The Beginning
It started off fairly evenly balanced.  There were far more Live Feeders than Admin on OBB.  The only assistance that Channel 5 could count on was a group of posters on OBB, often similarly poor spellers and given to text speak, who could be guaranteed to applaud each item delivered by Channel 5 to the OBB.   In response to the vigorous posting by Live Feeders Channel 5 started to delete anything which did not carry the message that Channel 5 wished to publish.  This led to a major escalation in posting by Live Feeders.  This in turn led to Channel 5 blocking people from posting on OBB.  Many posters responded by rejoining Facebook to get back onto OBB and openly discussed when they should concentrate their efforts.  Friday was chosen as a good day to focus their efforts.  

The Middle
In response OBB raised their game and staffing levels.
They identified the group of people that are real thorns in their side and they seem to be trying to get that group isolated from anyone else who comes in to harangue them by asking for Live Feed. A classic divide and rule.
In response to the improved organisation of the Live Feeders Channel 5 seemed to adopt a new strategy on that Friday evening.  They began reporting any new posters on OBB to Facebook as spammers.  FB responded by putting those accounts through the Verify hurdle where you need to provide a phone number, or identify 5 of your friends from random photographs from their albums that they have been tagged in (not their profile pictures).  I was shown pictures of a car bumper and a mobile phone in my set.

It is my belief that once they have just the 'thorns' isolated they will add them to a group and switch them off as a single entity if they wish knowing that nobody else will come into OBB to replace them.  Anyone who arrives on OBB and then is put through and passes the Verify step will either be blocked or added to the 'thorns' group.  Since Friday many Live Feeders have lost their accounts.  As I write this on Monday OBB appear to have resorted to blocking again as I suspected they would, and are still selecting accounts to go through the Verify process to regain their profiles.  They believe that they now know who the core members of the Live Feeders are.  They also must know that arranged against them are a tenacious group of resourceful and articulate people.  The writing abilities of some of the sycophantic OBB supporters group are not obvious and many of them seem to be angry and habitual flamers who readily abuse anyone who does not agree with whatever they are trying to say.

The battle continues.  Channel 5 are not prepared to listen to reason and to engage in any dialogue.  They are behaving like petulant children who insist that it is their game and their rules.  Channel 5 are oppressing the free speech of the OBB posters and Facebook are acting as the removers of those who Channel 5 do not like.  If it looks like censorship and acts like censorship it is censorship.

Channel 5 have also put in place (with Facebook's assistance) a non-UK IP block to prevent anyone from outside the area from having any sort of say in how the programme is presented to us.  Americans, for example, are not only prevented from seeing any highlight shows, or web/YouTube based clips but they cannot even say anything about it on the OBB.  Northern & Shell say on their website: "Northern & Shell was founded in December 1974 with the vision of becoming a significant force in British and worldwide media."  and they are "determined to maintain all its products and activities as benchmarks of excellence to its readers, customers, advertisers and business partners."  These seem laudable and lofty ideals which are not very obvious to me in the way Channel 5 is conducting its Big Brother business.

I had a glance at a thread on OBB early this morning before the Live Feeders had stirred themselves for another day of posting.  I saw what happens when they are not there to post.  It was not interesting, not thoughtful, not stimulating or witty.  It was bland, insipid and banal.  That is what OBB will be without the Live Feeders who represent the philosophical, educated and articulate wing of the Big Brother audience.  If the Live Feeders leave Facebook the OBB page will be nothing.  The audience for the show is evaporating week on week.  Channel 5 have pinned their hopes on Social Media interactions as the stimulus for the show but it looks doomed to failure. 

The End
One of my colleagues spent an interesting hour or two going back through past threads the other day.  I say interesting only because all the older threads had been carefully examined and any post that was not to Channel 5's liking had been removed.  History had been rewritten.  No doubt future historians, combing through the Facebook archives will realise what a great success this series has been, universally acclaimed and enjoyed throughout the land.  The more astute amongst them may ask why it was taken off the air if it was such a great success, but the past is written by the Victors.  And nobody liked him very much at the time did they?  Channel 5 are going out of their way to portray the Live Feeders as anti Big Brother but nothing could be further from the truth.  They are just decent people who enjoyed the show in the past and would like to enjoy it again.  They want it to be the show they loved before Channel 5 provided their scripted reality BB version of TOWIE.

As I said at the top, this is my view.  If you have anything to add or subtract please leave a comment.  I will read it and if I think that you are more correct than me unlike Channel 5 I will do something about it.  Thank you for reading. 

Absolutely pathetic BB, you are hopeless and you must know it by now

Many things are doubtless occurring in the BB house that Dirty Desmond and his underlings would prefer that we did not know about right now. Our moments of revelation will arrive in the magazine scoops afterwards. Scoops indeed, and not just for scooping out the freezer. But by their actions you can get an insight into how they are thinking though.

Consider this. We don't have live feed because they have a pathological obsession for controlling every aspect of the show. That works while the lab rats are in there but when they come out the game is up. Two housemates have told tales about Jay.

BB has tried to supress all mention of the second incident. They have edited videotapes and have employed extensive filtering on Facebook to stop anyone mentioning freezers and shit and a wide variety of synonyms for those words. But the world prefers to enjoy the words from the lips of Heaven than the BB spin machine. She may be as batty as a cave full of bats but she is honest. He did shit in the fridge. Fact 1.

Fact 2 is that Jay was told off for saying the 'deeply offensive' word 'black'. Well deeply offensive to the chattering classes perhaps. He used it in the context of telling a joke by using a poorly remembered film quote. So what? No more offensive than his stories about fisting, muff diving and five in a bed romps to most people. The only interesting thing is that BB chose to show the incident and his resulting admonition.

A poster on Facebook took this to mean that he did not crap in the freezer because we would have seen him being told off for being naughty. Abject bollox of course. The reason BB showed the incident and the Diary Room sequel was to show us that they are as tough on naughtiness as they were when Emily got the boot for saying the N word to the C woman.

The insight into BB is that they thought that we would swallow this feeble bit of spin. The freezer crap never occurred because if it did we would have seen Jay being told off.

And one gullible poster actually said it, although it is very doubtful if that was his own thought, expressed in the particularly inarticulate way so beloved by many of the posters, or if he was used to plant it into our consciousness.

Either way no dice BB.  You thought that if you showed us Jay being told off for one massive crime, we would realise that we had not seen him being told off for taking a dump in the freezer, therefore it could not have happened.  You are as hopeless at spin as you are at many of the other aspects of the programme.  We see nothing except what you choose to show us i.e. very little.  You chose not to show us the freezer dump and you chose to show us naughty Jay being told off for that worst sin in the whole world.   Social Media will be your downfall CH5.

BB is sponsored by Andrex toilet tissue, so soft you can use it straight from the freezer

Heaven: "Jay is cool, apart from him shitting in our freezer and having to get all our food bloody taken out"

Company Stooge "Allegedly, allegedly, allegedly"

Heaven: "No he actually did do that for a joke"

Company Stooge ""Allegedly, allegedly, allegedly, keep going"

Heaven: "Come on, you lot saw that"

Heaven on BBBOTS

We never saw it Heaven.   No live Feed thank goodness.  It makes Sandy pissing in the bin pale into insignificance though.

I have a headache brought on by BB - bring back Luke Marsden

I am a week older.  I have seen no Life Feed (in truth I haven't watched much of the HL show either).  Many of the show participants have previously appeared in some sort of acting video or song video or are registered as actors - whatever that means.
The OBB FB posters have revealed themselves as pretty incompetent and their admin/moderation policies towards non-"approved content" posters have been confirmed as consistently ruthless.

The show is absolutely dire (all 45 minutes of it) regardless of the soundtrack selected.  It is so bad that I popped into my Time Machine to 2008 to look at the Live Feed and have a browse on the C4 forum.  At the time we never thought things could get any worse, but we were badly mistaken.  We saw the stream and set our own agendas in the forums.  We decided what we would talk about and as long as we were not really nasty we could say what we chose..  Choice was the key issue.  We could watch what we wanted and the discussion topics we wanted were the ones we had.  Compare that to Twitter and Facebook now.  We cannot see what is happening and we are supposed to sit like Pavlovian dogs responding to each new inanity set by poorly trained simpletons employed by the very people who deny our requests for Live feed.

The viewing figures are dismal - earlier today there was talk about the summer like weather causing people to not come in at 10pm to watch the show (sunset is about 18:45 now).  If that is their best excuse it will be interesting to see what it is when the weather returns to Autumn normal next week.  There was even a suggestion that they may pull the show rather than admit they are doing something wrong.

They seem unable to accept that it the how they are doing it rather than the show itself that is at fault.  They can turn it round if they push that stream they are providing to journos out to the public - red button if they can.  Then sell the stream on the web to whoever will pay for it, regardless of country.  If that is at odds with their broadcast license terms then they should do something about it rather than going down without a fight.  They are taking the cowards way out if they drop the show because of the piss poor decisions that they have made so far.  And if there is one big fat ego at the root of it all then they should put him and his team of whizzo 'blue sky' thinkers out to grass and get in some people who understand that the show is only one thing - a social contract between the viewers and the show providers.  If they do not provide what we want we walk away.

Today I read a thread I wrote about Luke Marsden on C4 Forum in June 2008.  We loathed him and we watched him.  The posts in the thread were so funny that I had tears rolling down my cheeks.  It was a subject that we chose, we had observations to talk about, we had humour, sarcasm and a community.  Regardless of what Channel 5 and Big Brother may think, we have little of that now.  I never cared much for Luke but he was funny then and he probably is now.  He may have been a pain but he never gave me the headache that this load of bozos is; and the HMs are pretty irritating as well.

2 Evictions down - and what have we got?

I think it is fair to say that they are pissed off with us.  We are pissed off with them so that is all square.  Today's questions are therefore...

1. Does Live Feed seem any nearer?

2. How is Twitter filling the gap?

3. Does FB work?

4. How are CH5 reacting?

5. Where do we go from here?

Does Live Feed seem any nearer?

I think it is a fair bet that although we can see nothing out here in the tumbleweeds, deep in panic control there will be a contingency plan.  My view is that the delivery of advertising revenue from the sponsors would have been contractually dependent on the delivery of an audience.  If the sponsors did not insist on that, they may as well have given their cash to charity.

If I can take that as a given then it follows that there would have been a target number involved.  Perhaps the phrase used was that Ch5 would deliver an audience of or greater than X.  Down in the weeds it would have stipulated where and how that audience was measured.  For TV they would use BARB.  For the selected 'Social Media' they would have taken some measurement of the Facebook hits and possibly click-throughs to their web page and videos.  How they measure Twitter is beyond me at the moment because all I see is one way traffic - an endless stream of pointless Tweets from them - ranging from the inane to the totally absurd.  That one-way torrent of drivel cannot be used as a valid measurement for financial transactions.  So, we don't know what they measure and against what target.

What do we know then?  Well, rumours suggest that they have given themselves a deadline to hit targets.  That means, if taken at face value, that they are not meeting them.

What else do we know?  The handling of Nikki Cowan suggests an element of absolute panic in Ch5 - at least in Borehamwood.  The left hand did not know what the right hand was doing and the way they reacted suggests that someone very high up the organisation had shouted at the underlings and they reacted in the way that people do when shouted at. The someone would have to be above the programme producers.  Perhaps in the rarefied air inhabited by dear Jefford.  I would imagine that he is sick and tired of hearing 'Live feed'.  The terseness of his response to questions about Live Feed suggested someone of a testy disposition.  Perhaps the decision to drop it rest on his shoulders and he feels the cold wind from the Job Centre beckoning?   Certainly it suggests that he is the person who will have to change his mind and allow the stream to return to our computers at least.  Perhaps he doesn't like us?  Perhaps he won't take any notice of us?  Perhaps he will only listen to the advertisers and their lawyers?

I asked a colleague of mine about a useful way forward for the campaign.  This was the response.

HOW:
Social Media, the same way Ch5 are trying to control the program. Not just one FB group, a dozen or more. All on the same message, all saying the same things. Twitter, again everybody tweets and re-tweets each other. Over and over again using hashtags to get a trend going. STAY ON MESSAGE AT ALL TIMES, ignore the trolls but re-tweet them to increase the trend.

WHO:
Firstly, Channel Five, ALL of Ch5 not just the program. Directors, heads of department, newspaper editors, everybody. Secondly the fans. Not just the aggrieved like yourself but the others who are still tuning in. Tell them what they are missing and why and keep telling them.

TARGETS:
The Advertisers, they are paying for the program and have very thin skins when it comes to public criticism, they don't like being shown up as supporting an unpopular program.
Again, Channel 5. E-mail complaints and 'suggestions' on how to improve the show.

Enough from me, feel free to suggest anything else you can think of or disagree if you like. If you REALLY want live feed to come back, ever, you have to do something before the end of this show.

 Perhaps Live Feed will get a bit nearer if we adopt these strategies.


How is Twitter filling the gap?
The answer is that it provides the 'endless stream of pointless tweets' that give us the opportunity for ReTweeting and generating publicity.  It will never fill the 'Live Feed Gap' because all it is is somebody else telling us what we should be thinking.  And that, dear Mr Jefford is precisely what Live Feed wasn't.  We watched, we formed our own opinions and we spread the opinions and defended them.

Does FB work?
It provides Ch5 with what they want and it gives us the opportunity to aggravate them.  Ch5 are reduced to inventing whole groups of 'flavoured' posters to combat the constant Live Feed chorus.  Some days they are all Nigerian-ish, others they are Irish-ish depending on who in the office has the job of spamming the walls with pro-Ch5 twaddle.  FB is not working for them unless they are generating enough click-throughs to satisfy the sponsors.  They cannot be measuring traffic on wall posts because they keep on deleting ours.  As long as we do not click through their video or picture links, or take part in the polls we should be doing them no good at all.

How are CH5 reacting?

Badly.  Which is good news for us.

Where do we go from here?
See above in blue.

Do not give up.

Kit Marsters writes - Big Brother - How to Win Back Viewers

Huffy Post

Channel 5 must have expected ratings to drop after Celebrity Big Brother. They must have expected it, as Celebrity Big Brother tends to attract a higher amount of viewers than the regular series. Whether or not they expected a drop of nearly 50% compared to the last series on Channel 4 is a different matter. According to Barb overnight figures, the first five episodes pulled in an average of just 1.7 million viewers, with the first eviction watched by 1.83 million. Indications are that even 1.7 million is proving difficult to maintain, as on Thursday only 1.16 million tuned in to see the highlights. A record low was reached on Saturday, when a mere 900,000 viewers showed an interest. With some eight weeks of Big Brother still to come, it will be interesting to see if Channel 5 can get their audience back to above the 1 million mark, or if even more people will switch off.
Whilst such ratings are still pretty decent for the channel, and they may actually be content with them, it is clear to Big Brother viewers that all is not well.
Why are dedicated fans abandoning their beloved show?
Why are people who have watched the show from series one now moving on?
And what can be done to win them back?
For Linda, it's simple. "Two words are all that's needed - live feed!" She says that she has been a stalwart fan for years, but she will not watch without the feed.
Bradley is still watching but feels that there is room for improvement. He agrees with Linda on the live feed issue.
"Whilst I see their thinking, the people who watch the live feed are the hardcore fans who will watch it no matter what. We are down to the core now. Their thinking is that by providing live feed it makes it harder to hide things and won't get more people watching. They are wrong in the sense that those people are the people who spread the word to the ones who won't watch live feed, who don't know what's going on so won't bother to watch the highlights show. If a BB fan tells them, "You've got to see it tonight, there was a massive argument last night," then others will tune in and become more involved."
Bradley also thinks that the producers should go back to basics. "BB has felt the need to constantly change, whereas apart from the tasks people enjoy the same things that encouraged them to watch in the first place.
The nominations process keeps changing. Go back to the way it was. None of the "surprise" things work; they don't encourage people to tune in, there's no need. Let's go back to nominations on Monday, the announcement on Tuesday, and eviction on Friday. One of the most important parts of the show has constantly been altered and people miss it. In the last few series they didn't even show some housemates actually nominating. With this in mind, the extra nomination programme, when we would see more of the nominations, would be helpful if it returned."
He prefers Big Brother to keep it real. "At present they do everything to create arguments, so much so that none of the arguments are real and are a nightly thing, therefore no one cares. In the first few series when an argument occurred it mattered, because it was real, organic and in some cases, as with Nasty Nick, brewing for weeks. Now they won't let them sleep during the day or allow anything to stimulate them. Give them the opportunity to sleep for an hour or two, or even allow reading material for an hour a day. This will help produce more energy and more excitement. At present they aren't allowed anything but just to sit and wait for a task. They do it to create tension, but in the end it produces boredom and silly arguments. Arguments will come naturally if you allow them to."
Sarah says she used to be an avid viewer. "I loved the sociological/psychological aspect of the show. When I say that, I mean it in terms of group dynamics and being shut away from the outside world, not as a substitute for the care in the community/"OMG I wanna be famous" culture. As a social scientist it was fabulous to see how people formed groups and dealt with isolation. I loved Nasty Nick, because Nick showed some fascinating human traits and instincts to win. It was all about how people get on. I love people watching and this really is the ultimate people watching show. Live footage was brilliant when I was revising for exams - Big Brother has more or less covered my entire career as a student.
"Sadly the show seems to have gone along with the moral decline in this country. It's now about mad people who want to be famous and have the morals and attitudes of alley cats rather than group dynamics. It also celebrates this "I wanna be a star" culture; you never get academics on BB do you? We aren't all boring, but we do have standards. Now it's like care in the community titillation. Let's put a load of unstable people in a house for several months, lock the door and see what happens - carnage! Horrendous, it gives off completely the wrong image to the kids who are the target audience.
"I suppose the major question is why do the producers/makers feel the programme has to be this way now? That's something I'd love to know.
"Let's go back to the more psychological/sociological experiment format. I think the concept has gone from seeing how people react to different situations, to really pushing them to extremes purely for TV entertainment. It's like a human zoo. The problem is, I suppose this could be a reflection of a bad change in society in general, so Big Brother is a symptom. Have tasks, and games, and challenges that test people's endurance etcetera, rather than make them look stupid. I find it really worrying, always have when people leave and are booed by people they have never met."
Bradley agrees with Sarah about the booing. "Eviction night booing. It's revolting and does nothing to improve occasional viewers' feelings on the show. Totally unnecessary and should be banned. Eviction nights used to be special, now they are ruined by nastiness to evicted housemates who often find it terrifying. If so called hardcore fans boo these people, why should others bother to watch? Ban it and tell people there that if they do boo, they will be kicked out and banned in the future."
Sarah has a final point to make: "Have a wider range of people on the show, from different walks of life. The twists that have seen people go into houses in different countries have been fascinating! The age range this year is 18-30, and they all have a very similar demographic."
Whilst the views expressed here are those of just three Big Brother viewers, their sentiments appear to be reflected around the forums. Will they be listened to? Channel 5 and Endemol decide.

BB - Big Brother or Bigger Bully

Huffington Post

Kit Marsters

Writer. Novel editor. Student. Crazy old cat lady.

GET UPDATES FROM Kit Marsters

Big Brother Versus Mr Nikki Cowan - The Ongoing Saga

Posted: 23/9/11 15:13 GMT

Whilst for many viewers the Big Brother experience on Channel 5 has soured somewhat, for Nikki Cowan it's personal. Living only a stone's throw away from Elstree Studios in Borehamwood, he's perfectly placed to be the official reporter for Big Brother's Bit on the Radio, the unofficial but increasingly popular radio show. Each week he attends the live shows and chats with members of the audience. Later in the night, he reports his experiences live on the radio.
After twice using an Applause Store ticket, on his third visit security and members of the crew referred to him as "the guy from the radio", and he was offered a pass. On subsequent visits he didn't even have to show his ticket. He could simply go to the office, request his pass and sign it out. One visit it was suggested he attend the spin-off show Big Brother's Bit on the Side, though he was advised not to plug the radio show. This was fine by Nikki, who happily accepted the offer.
On Big Brother's Bit on the Side he kept his promise, but he did mention the live feed, much to the delight of many viewers. He also admits to using a "rude word" towards Darryn Lyons. Despite that, he was told he'd been a great guest and would be welcome back.
Unfortunately, it all went downhill from there. "After spending five hours at the compound for the finale of Celebrity Big Brother and having lovely chats with Sally Bercow, Kerry Katona, Brian Belo and Marcus Akin ,and leaving on a high to do the radio show... the next day, for no reason, I was banned.
I arrived to report from the live launch of civilian Big Brother and was greeted on the door by a panicked and irate producer. She instructed the security guards to barricade the entrance and not let me in. As if I was going to rush the gate. She insisted I wasn't with the radio show. She then refused to speak to me."
Nikki ended up going to the main gate, where he was met by security once again. He asked to speak to a producer, and a Bit on the Side crew member told him that it had nothing to do with them; they had no control. They suggested he get in touch with one of the main producers during the week. Feeling rather puzzled, Nikki went home.
"That week I spoke to one of the producers of Bit on the Side, who told me I had upset someone on Big Brother by saying I had permission to be there from him. I unequivocally denied it, as that was a total lie. He said he would find out more and call me back.
When he called me back he told me categorically that, as long as I had a press pass or an audience pass I was allowed back and that I was most certainly not banned. I therefore got myself an Applause Store ticket, like I'd done every time, and went back on Friday."
On the Friday, he discovered that matters had not been solved. Soon after arriving for Tashie's eviction, a member of the Applause Store team asked to see his ticket. Nikki showed it to him, and the team member took it and walked off.
Nikki made his apologies to the people in the queue who he was talking to and followed the team member. At that point he was beckoned over by a police officer and surrounded by security. "I could hear people in the queue gasping and muttering as I was treated like a felon and questioned over my reasons for being there."
He was told by the police that he was not coming onto the site, and that he should go home. Feeling confused, he asked to speak to someone higher up. There'd obviously been a mix up; he'd been told, after all, that he wasn't banned.
Accompanied to the main gate by a member of security and the police officer, he was told over the phone by a member of the production team that they had no problem with him being on the show. They claimed it was full and that they had no control over who the main show let in. They stated they didn't know why he was banned or if, indeed, he even was.
"I was told by the police officer in a very condescending manner that I'd be best off going home. I reminded the officer that I was still allowed on Tesco's land, which Big Brother use for the fans to queue up before the gates open. The security guard concurred, telling me not to cross the railings where the people queue. I duly conceded but returned to the queue."
That night, Nikki had with him a set of posters inspired by housemate Tashie's fish finger incident. Designed by a listener of the radio show, Twitter followers loved it so much that Nikki had a set printed to hand out to audience members. "In my possession that day were 52 posters, A3 size in colour with pictures of Big Brother housemate Tashie crying with a fish finger wedged in her mouth. Down the side of the picture was her name spelt using only the bread-crumbed-meal-time-favourite. As I spoke to people for their opinions, I gave out a free poster."
Right after handing out the last one, security marched down the queue and shouted for the posters to be handed in. The people in the queue were in shock, according to Nikki, and asked to be allowed to keep them, even if just as a souvenir. They were told that the only way to keep their posters would be if they left with them now - they'd not be allowed to take them in. If they did want to come in, they had to hand over their posters, which would be burned.
"I was even told not to do it and that it was wrong. I left soon after, telling the queue not to get into trouble over me."
Nikki was further surprised when he received a tweet from one of his contacts inside the compound, who'd taken a photograph of warm-up act Andy Collins telling the audience that if they were in possession of one of the posters that they "must hand them in or get booted out!"
"Needless to say I was not in a good mood for the radio show that night and shall not bother trying to get back in this week. I will, however, still talk to the queue. Let them try and stop me!"
Nikki's experiences are the most recent in a series of events that have left fans of Big Brother confused and dismayed. Several viewers, making use of the show's Facebook page, have found themselves blocked from the page and even banned from the social networking site altogether. They insist that their comments weren't rude of controversial, nor did they spam the page - one poster only left a single message with a polite request for live streaming.
Viewers from outside the UK, including those from Ireland, are unable to view the clips on Facebook, lauded as the new way to enjoy the Big Brother experience.
Channel 5's press office has been invited to respond to Nikki's experiences, but thus far there has been no comment.