[Tom]

Originally posted by Stentionhouse

BB can't exist without the live feed (at least not with enough viewers to make it viable). Events that happen on the LF are picked up by the forums and the media. The word is spread and more people take an interest. That's how BB1, BB3 and BB5 became massive successes.

With only 45 minutes of edited footage per day, to document the activities of 16 housemates over a 24 hour period, it's obvious that all viewers will see is a tiny fraction of what's actually been happening. It will be impossible to get to know most, if not all, of the HMs. Interest will wane within two weeks. After a month the viewing figures will be lower than they've ever been. By the six week mark it will be obvious the show is dead without the LF, but the producers will just start chucking more and more people in the house and coming up with ever more ludicrous twists.

It's a shame that a once great show has been reduced to this travesty.

Its inevitable that the ratings are going to be lower than they've ever been, its just a common trend because BB is dying because people are losing interest. The live feed isn't the solution as BB10 will be the 17th series of Big Brother and hardly any shows make it that far. The sad truth is it has run its course. Its time to accept that. BB can never be restored. But I doubt they're going to be significantly down. The furthest they'll drop to is imo what would result in a series average of 2.8m but I can see it staying above 3m. BB9 and CBB6 had similar levels of media interest (ie next to none), but oh wait the live feed causes forum discussion, tabloid stories and media interest, so ultimately higher viewing figures yet the ratings for the last week of CBB6 fell through the floor whilst BB9 held nice and steady despite having similar levels of coverage. Hmm, something doesn't ring right here ...

I also think its laughable that you think they'll do silly twists, thats so 2007. They never bothered with any in BB9 and CBB6 because we told them we didn't want them, y'know us forum members who know it all. It didn't exactly restore BB in the way we thought, maybe we don't know everything about what the public want.

Oh and I'd make a guess that the viewers know its edited especially as its the card the housemates always drag up if something hasn't been edited in their favour. But I don't know about you but I'd rather watch 46 minutes of scripted, edited and biased highlights if they're entertaining rather than being bored stiff watching someone cook pasta whilst bird noise plays in the background.

[Scarlett.]

I put it on when I wanted to sleep....yeah thats how boring live feed was

I watched it properly very occasionally

[BIG-BRO-FAN]

I thought the whole purpose of BB was to follow housemates living their lives and watching their EVERY move. This is 2009 we're living in, those 'live feed' facilities should be their day and night.

[Scarlett.]

Originally posted by BIG-BRO-FAN
I thought the whole purpose of BB was to follow housemates living their lives and watching their EVERY move. This is 2009 we're living in, those 'live feed' facilities should be their day and night.

You're right, we are in 2009, but you seem to have forgetten, RECESSION

Cutbacks have to be made, and live feed was the cutback made

[Tom]

Originally posted by BIG-BRO-FAN
I thought the whole purpose of BB was to follow housemates living their lives and watching their EVERY move. This is 2009 we're living in, those 'live feed' facilities should be their day and night.

Was.

In 2000 when it started it was a social experiment with the novelty of the show to watch it when you wanted and stayed like that until BB5. Since BB5 it has been predominantly an entertainment show and streaming has been stripped away bit by bit to reflect that.

Its just an evolution of the show more than anything. Viewers will get over it after a week or so if they genuinely like BB that much.

[matty0boy]

i usually just watch it late at night when there's nothin on the tele ......or at dinner time when am bored of daytime television

[Stentionhouse]

Originally posted by Chewy

You're right, we are in 2009, but you seem to have forgetten, RECESSION

Cutbacks have to be made, and live feed was the cutback made

If they can't afford to make the show, they should cut their losses and pay up the remainder of the contract.

It's pretty obvious that cost is just an excuse.

[Stentionhouse]

Originally posted by Tom

Was.

In 2000 when it started it was a social experiment with the novelty of the show to watch it when you wanted and stayed like that until BB5. Since BB5 it has been predominantly an entertainment show and streaming has been stripped away bit by bit to reflect that.

Its just an evolution of the show more than anything. Viewers will get over it after a week or so if they genuinely like BB that much.

So why does every other country in the world - even those on their tenth and eleventh main series - still have the 24/7 live feed? Constant surveillance is the entire reason for BB's existence. BB isn't a talent show or a soap opera. But that's what it has become.

[Stentionhouse]

Oops, made a hash of that

[Tom]

Originally posted by Stentionhouse

So why does every other country in the world - even those on their tenth and eleventh main series - still have the 24/7 live feed? Constant surveillance is the entire reason for BB's existence. BB isn't a talent show or a soap opera. But that's what it has become.

BBUK has done the most series' of BB in the world and clearly UK viewers watch it in different ways. If it doesn't have a major impact on BB10 (which I really doubt it will) then I can see other countries following suit.

[BIG-BRO-FAN]

The live feed is still being shown overnight, right? Better than nothing I say.

[Brekkie]

Originally posted by Tom
Most viewers who call themselves fans probably won't go any further than the Channel 4 website when looking online. Forum members are in a huge minority when it comes to BB.

So as you post on a forum you can't call yourself a fan?

BB was one of the first shows to establish an online fanbase- and ignoring that fanbase is just stupid. The majority of viewers now have access to the web, and even if they venture no further than the official site, there experience of BB will be affected with no live feed - because with no live feed, there's no need to update the official site. They didn't really bother too much in January.

Originally posted by Tom
Its inevitable that the ratings are going to be lower than they've ever been, its just a common trend because BB is dying because people are losing interest. The live feed isn't the solution as BB10 will be the 17th series of Big Brother and hardly any shows make it that far. The sad truth is it has run its course. Its time to accept that. BB can never be restored.

I don't dispute over time interest wanes, and every show has a natural timespan, but for any other show they do whatever is possible to extend that timespan.

If it works, the show can survive a few extra years - many years in some cases, but if it doesn't, they really haven't lost much as the show was on it's way out anyway.

The problem is C4 aren't even trying.


Spain, Italy, Brazil and the USA have all been running for about as long as us (nine or ten regular series, but generally longer than most BBUK series, so equalling out the effect of Celeb BB etc.) - and they've all seen ratings rise for their latest series.

The US and to a certain extent Italy went back to basics, Spain did their "GH1" house twist for the tenth season - which was a relatively simple twist, while Brazil arguably put in the most effort with a Rich/Poor divide (just for a week or so though) and notably the House of Glass - but still relatively simple twists.

[Tom]

Originally posted by Brekkie

So as you post on a forum you can't call yourself a fan?

BB was one of the first shows to establish an online fanbase- and ignoring that fanbase is just stupid. The majority of viewers now have access to the web, and even if they venture no further than the official site, there experience of BB will be affected with no live feed - because with no live feed, there's no need to update the official site. They didn't really bother too much in January.

I didn't say about not being able to call yourself a fan if you post on a forum? I just meant a lot of people who don't post on the forum but watch BB will call themselves BB fans.

I think we should wait and see what they do in the summer over the website. Because its the main series (and possibly the most pivotal series of all so far, I know it gets said all the time but this one genuinely is make or break) they might take it a little more seriously and update it.

Originally posted by Brekkie

I don't dispute over time interest wanes, and every show has a natural timespan, but for any other show they do whatever is possible to extend that timespan.

If it works, the show can survive a few extra years - many years in some cases, but if it doesn't, they really haven't lost much as the show was on it's way out anyway.

The problem is C4 aren't even trying.


Spain, Italy, Brazil and the USA have all been running for about as long as us (nine or ten regular series, but generally longer than most BBUK series, so equalling out the effect of Celeb BB etc.) - and they've all seen ratings rise for their latest series.

The US and to a certain extent Italy went back to basics, Spain did their "GH1" house twist for the tenth season - which was a relatively simple twist, while Brazil arguably put in the most effort with a Rich/Poor divide (just for a week or so though) and notably the House of Glass - but still relatively simple twists.

You can't really say they're not trying anything. Last year they tweaked the format to close to what us online fans thought would work and it didn't, maybe they didn't do it right. They developed it for CBB6. I don't know if they continued it though, I stopped watching properly around when Lucy was evicted. But theres nothing to say they aren't trying anything new this year, quite the opposite in fact with some of the things in the papers and the new tag line. I think we need to see how it pans out before saying things like that.

As bizarre as it sounds, no live feed could maybe tie in with a "new" BB? I think we'll just have to wait and see what they do

[Brekkie]

Originally posted by Tom
I didn't say about not being able to call yourself a fan if you post on a forum? I just meant a lot of people who don't post on the forum but watch BB will call themselves BB fans.

The forum fans though are likely to be the ones who watched as much of BB as they could, so hence used the interactive fan.

The non-forum fan are probably more likely to just watch the main shows, but even so I'm sure many of those watch because they like the idea of watching a show where people can be watched 24/7, and even if they don't use the live feed themselves, an element of the show they enjoy has been removed.

Originally posted by Brekkie
You can't really say they're not trying anything. Last year they tweaked the format to close to what us online fans thought would work and it didn't, maybe they didn't do it right. They developed it for CBB6. I don't know if they continued it though, I stopped watching properly around when Lucy was evicted.

They really did not develop it for CBB6 at all. The made a big thing out of Head of House in the first week, got the HMs and the viewers all speculating about who would be the next HoH and how it would affect the show - and then decided not to bother!


I agree last year the producers did put more effort in, but they didn't get the support they needed from the channel. None of the big twists were ever promoted by C4, and even the live specials were lucky to get a promo on the day itself, while the scheduling of the flagship evictions did the show no favours - and hence the ratings fell. Indeed a good chunk of the 300,000 fall can be put down to the 1m+ lost each week for the eviction show.


I know Heaven and Hell and HoH really splits opinion amongst the fans, but for me starting it around week 6 IIRC was just far too late - the show needed that change much earlier (arguably from the start), and 4 weeks in the middle with Heaven and Hell didn't cut it. I am glad though HoH continued through to the end of the series.

My one criticism was that after a couple of weeks of the HoH deciding who lives in heaven and hell, which really did shake things up in the house, they took that power away from the HoH and left it up to the outcome of the tasks - which although it may have been fairer, it removed a lot of the resentment felt by the HMs from Hell to the HoH and Heavenly HMs, and a lot of the deals which were being done by people trying to secure a place in heaven.

[Tom]

By developing it I just meant giving them their own room so if its back for BB10 we could see yet another evolution of it (perhaps the they choose one person to be up idea?) and the ratings for the second eviction were actually quite good. Overnights were awful but mainly because it cut to streaming and lost about 1m viewers, then had adverts whilst it was still meant to be on air. The officials are a lot better and were not far off the main show apart from the odd week, though I think this summer it could do with going out from 9-10.15pm

[Tom4784]

I agree with Tom.

[ozzycam]

I couldnt wait to get everyone packed off in the morning, so i could hog the telly to myself, and id still be watching when they came back home.......lol