Reality TV - Big Brother Australia

The widely successful and popular reality show TV, Big Brother Australia, is back on air once again. Big Brother 5 promises to offer more surprises, more action, more hype and is set to be bigger than ever before.

A Worldwide Phenomenon
Big Brother has been broadcasted all over the world, in countries such as Australia, America and UK sharing with viewers season after season of reality TV drama, romance and the like. It is an important form of interactive reality TV, in the way it engages its audiences to 'vote off' their least favourite housemate via SMS text messaging, internet use and telephone calls, with the winner taking home a prize of $1 million. Many other series' of the show around the world (including America and the United Kingdom) have incorporated this form of interaction into the workings of the program. The contestants may be different, the level of talent may be different, but there is no real difference in the way the votes are cast nor interactive nature of these reality TV shows.

Big Brother 5
After 4 seasons of Big Brother Australia success, the reality show TV still haven't lost it's appeals. In fact, latest ratings figures show that Big Brother 5 has lifted channel Ten's weekly ratings to tie with Nine in five capital cities. There has been an improvement on the show's popularity since Big Brother 4 to the new Big Brother 5 season.

Ten has a lot riding on the performance of Big Brother 5 after a poor start to the year. The X Factor has under performed and the local version of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy was a disaster, pulled after just three episodes. Big Brother is key to the network's fortunes.

Once Big Brother starts, it dominates Ten's schedule. The show is on most nights of a week, with special shows such as nomination night, eviction night, the all new Friday night live and others taking up much of Ten's prime time viewing. Like the AFL finals season or a major sporting event that comes and goes every year, Big Brother is an event on the calendar and will be around for years to come.