[Brekkie]

As I've gone to the effort of writing a blog, and as is it's out of season you're probably not keeping an eye on the fansites, I'm posting part of my latest BB Spy blog here, and would like your views on the topic too, whether here or in the comments over there...

The financial woes of ITV, C4 and Five have been well documented - although there are those that believe C4 are actually much more financially secure than they’re letting on. After a year of pleading poverty and concentrating on selling their PSB credentials, C4 have finally admitted that they need to exploit their “commercially successful” programming in order to help fund any PSB ambitions.

However, the corporation still appears to be letting its biggest cash cow (Big Brother, in case you were wondering!) fade into obscurity, with all indications pointing to it ending next year, and little ambition from C4 to prevent the show meeting it’s date with destiny. Indeed C4 now think so little of it in the press pack for the Spring and Summer mention of Big Brother was limited to just a footnote in the Factual Entertainment section.

Now, nobody is denying that the show is in trouble - out of the main UK reality shows Big Brother was the only one last year to loose viewers, while Celebrity Big Brother was seen as creatively bankrupt by many long term fans. However, most fans believe the show at least deserves a shot of coming back from the dead - and really C4 have nothing to lose. If a revamp works, it could give another few years of life to the format. If it doesn’t, well, they were going to axe it anyway.

With the latest ratings of 2.5-3m Big Brother’s future isn’t as financially secure as it once was, but if the effort was put in to boost the audience figures back to around the 3.5m level, financially at least it could become attractive to C4 once again, especially if the cost of production could also be trimmed back.

Full blog available here

I'm going to be looking at how Big Brother can cut costs in my next blog, so any thoughts here are welcome, especially regarding the spin-offs, the importance of Davina and the other hosts and any areas where you think money can be saved.

[ILoveTRW]

All ready beat you to saying that the credit crunch will be good for BB

http://www.thisisbigbrother.com/foru...687#pid1792569

[Brekkie]

Damn you!

It's widely reported that viewing figures are expected to go up for TV as a whole - yet no TV company seems to be doing anything to embrace this. Indeed ITV are doing their best to make you turn off!

[Tom]

I don't think Big Brother can be compared with the main reality shows. IMO the shows you're on about are not reality shows.

I also don't think the ratings for a 3 week long celebrity series can determine how the summer series will perform.

[Fat.Rat]

i just want bb to be the way it used to be

[Brekkie]

Originally posted by Tom
I don't think Big Brother can be compared with the main reality shows. IMO the shows you're on about are not reality shows.

I also don't think the ratings for a 3 week long celebrity series can determine how the summer series will perform.

I think some just find it convenient to ignore them, but the fact is they are the same product and they are linked. Now, if CBB's were down just a couple of hundred thousand you'd be right - it wouldn't really be an indication of the shape BB is in. However, they were down very significantly, and if C4 and Endemol just brush it off in the same way you have nothing is going to improve this summer.


As for the other shows - for the record I don't class them as reality either - on the whole they're mainly talent shows.

However, like it or not Big Brother is classed in the same group by the media and gets the same sort of level of press coverage as shows ranging from The X Factor and Strictly to the likes of The Apprentice and I'm a Celeb - and they've all seen an increase in ratings in the last year, and in some cases record ratings too.

Big Brother is getting left behind, and because others are improving while BB is failing the gap is getting bigger and bigger. BB may have never matched the ratings of the big shows on BBC1 and ITV1, but for many years it punch well above it's weight and deserved it's place at the top table of reality TV. Now I'm not sure it would even get served.

[Tom]

They were down 0.3m on BB9 ... so pretty much only a couple of hundred thousand. There was the illusion that it was doing a lot worse than BB9 because BB9 had an official average of 3.6m and people were comparing that to overnights. Viewers aren't put off by just one bad series and are likely to return for the new series, along with other casual viewers who always watch launch night, hence CBB6 launched with over 6m viewers. I don't find it convenient to ignore them, I just don't think CBB figures are that relevant. They never have been and imo never will be purely because they attract a different audience than main BB.

People have written BB10 off already and its just pointless.

[andyman]

What was the ratings for the weekday highlights show (bb9)?

[Tom]

Originally posted by andyman
What was the ratings for the weekday highlights show (bb9)?

Full table here with overnights (pink) and officials (blue)

http://archive.insidebigbrother.net/bb9/ratings.ibb

[/saddo]

[jaybitches]

But most people view how mutch they like the series by the ratings not by what they thinkI liked bb9 and bb8 and they where first series to not have really good ratings.
How ever most people didnt lke it coz the ratings where down.
they judge the series by the ratings, if you get what i mean pml

[Tom]

Nah because loads of people liked BB9

[Rob]

i read this on BBSPY, nice blog brekkie

I really hope that channel 4 do renew their contract, what they need to do is donate part of the voting money to charity etc and then it will be profitable show which they won't think twice about renewing