BB Chaos culture

Big Brother Chaos Site Mission

Big Brother Chaos

June 2006

In the conclusion to the auditions article in 2005, the mission of Big Brother Chaos was stated. It is to educate, inform and entertain.

What this means:

• To "educate" readers is to encourage them to see the other side of the story. This is a show called 'Big Brother' so just like the real one you have to see the other side of the hype, spin, blatant lies and other insults to your intelligence (like selective editing on the reality show called 'Big Brother'). Educating readers also involves presenting other general information about Big Brother also.
• To "inform" is to notify readers of upcoming events on Big Brother. This site is a place where readers can find important news about the show in one location so that they do not need to search all over the place.
• Lastly, to "entertain" is to provide readers with both news and commentary during the series and general news updates during the off-season plus informative articles. This site is also a place with interactive areas where viewers of Big Brother can congregate to discuss the show or participate in polls.

Site name:

The whole idea with Big Brother is that there are meant to be regular surprises, moral or other conundrums for the contestants during the series and the element of absolute unpredictable Big Brother chaos (hence this site's name). Big Brother is a production that is a world of chaos and you will find that "chaos" here as well with so much reference content all over the site. Enjoy!

Big Brother Chaos General Site Information

November 2005

This section covers requests for comment from site staff for newspaper articles (a letter from the site's commentator about that is included). It also covers correctly referencing this site (a letter from the site's commentator about that is included) plus housemate applications, site update frequency information and other general information in response to questions that are often asked here by visitors.

Editorial requests

Hello,

My name is Ridge Rogue and I am the commentator and a writer on Big Brother Chaos and the one that handles media information requests. Due to the "strange" hours that I keep I can only look at questions via email which I'll happily answer and you may quote if appropriate. I have had several requests for comment from newspapers in recent years and this approach works best for me because I have more time to properly consider a good answer to each question among other reasons. So if you would like to consult with me just email the site (enter my name in the subject line if you like) and I'll get back to you within 24 hours usually.

Regards,

Ridge Rogue

Senior Contributor/Web Producer/Reality TV Commentator

Big Brother Chaos: http://www.BigBrotherChaos.com/

Idol Chaos: http://www.celebchaos.com/idolchaos

Please note that requests for comment from other media outlets are not considered currently, just newspapers.

Applications

Each year Big Brother Chaos receives emails from people asking to be a housemate. Potential applicants should note that Big Brother Chaos does not consider audition applications via email or in any other way. Please do not send photos and personal information in a request to be considered for a housemate position with Big Brother. There is an audition process each year and interested applicants should follow the directions given on this site in order to participate in that process.

Citing Big Brother Chaos as a reference in tertiary studies assignments

Each year some tertiary students that visit this site locally or from overseas always ask if they can reference the theory or statements made on this site. Generally permission is granted for this so one does not have to contact the site to ask for that. If a student does wish to use content contained herein they are strongly encouraged to consider plagiarism guidelines and reference this site appropriately in their report, essay, thesis or other work. Here is a brief letter from the main author of works on this site concerning this subject.

Hello,

As many articles on Big Brother Chaos are written by Ridge Rogue (me) you may reference accordingly. For example, following the usual standards for citing Internet references, within a sentence it would be "Rogue (2005) states ..." of course or you could use Celebchaos.com (2005) if you like. The full reference then is as in this example below:

Rogue, R. (2005). "Rogue Interview: Part One". Big Brother Chaos. Australia. Retrieved on November 8th, 2005 from http://www.BigBrotherChaos.com/archive/2005/rogueinterview.htm

If the article or page appears to be a collective staff effort (where no author's name is mentioned) then reference as in this example:

BigBrotherChaos.com. (2005). "Rogue Interview: Part One". Big Brother Chaos. Australia. Retrieved on November 8th, 2005 from http://www.BigBrotherChaos.com/archive/2005/rogueinterview.htm

or consult the relevant campus document for your faculty for the accepted version if it differs slightly from this.

Good luck in your work.

Regards,

Ridge Rogue

Senior Contributor

Big Brother Chaos

http://www.BigBrotherChaos.com/

Big Brother Chaos Information Disclaimer

Frequency of updates

Big Brother Chaos does not regularly offer up-to-the-minute information at any time of the year. As with similar sites people are welcome to use the interactive areas of this site to update fellow BB fans because that is what it is all here for (to share information). Although Big Brother Chaos will always try to offer information in a timely manner, especially scoops that other sites simply cannot provide, this site offers no guarantee that information will be presented as it happens or within a few hours thereafter. This site is only updated four to five days a week usually late in the evenings and only from Monday to Friday.

This is a fan site so please note that, whilst all care is taken to present accurate information, there may be some published information here, sent in to Big Brother Chaos that may be incorrect or more of a rumour or gossip in its nature, for which staff will not be held responsible.

Commercial information

Staff consider any requests from companies concerning sponsorship of this site so please contact us for more information. As of early 2005 Big Brother Chaos enjoys number one rankings in top search engines like Google for various Big Brother keyword phrases and the number two ranking (behind the official site) for the "Big Brother Australia" search phrase. If less than ten percent of the Internet community are able to influence the rest, according to research, then BB Chaos is an excellent medium to send your message to the fan base.

Where commercial requests for HMs are concerned, we do forward such requests but please note that the official site is your first contact for this. A link is provided there, at the bottom of the home page.

The "corporate" culture at Big Brother Chaos

November 2005

Here is a tale about a few friends that work together at the same company. They love to gather office gossip and spread it around as soon as it is available. Their dream is to work for the Associated Press where they can experience the adrenalin rush of breaking the big scoops to the world and give themselves a sense of importance in the process. One part of the story is an example of what some critics say you should not do when entertaining people while the other part of the story is an example of what you probably should do to entertain people. One of the examples is generally appreciated more by some while the other is not. You may recognise this story as an example of a situation that you have encountered before, especially right here on the Web so let us get started.

Jack and Jim arrived at work on Monday morning. They always arrive about ten minutes early so they can talk to their co-workers about their weekend. The two guys conversed furiously over a coffee with their workmates for about five minutes. Having gathered as much information as they can handle until lunchtime the guys sat down at their desks and looked at their day's workload. With a few minutes to spare before their official starting time they both began to check their emails. Nothing much had come in since late Friday so what will they do they ask themselves? Jack had a plan which he discussed with Jim who is seated next door to him in the adjoining cubicle. Jack started writing a gossip email to send out to the entire staff on his floor. In it he divulges information that is partially right and partially wrong just to throw people off track a little. This gossip was picked up earlier when he was chatting to the others so the guys can certainly claim an exclusive inside scoop there.

The email then went out and it included an invitation to respond with feedback and a notification that more updates will come as they happen. One of the sections of the message contains a nice little story suggesting that a current rumour says that Jill will be receiving two hours of overtime later this week at double pay. It then goes on to say that Jim reports that Jack is getting a promotion next Friday and he will receive a ten grand a year pay rise as a result. Well of course the whole office was stunned by this amazing news and they could not wait until the next update, just after lunch. That one then went out and it made the even more stunning claim that the two guys are all that and a bag of chips by comparison to their boss. Yes they actually believed that they were better workers than their boss and offered the company a lot more than he ever had. They even mentioned that their newsletter was better than the official company one despite the fact that there was only ever a fraction of the content in it. This whole story caused an immediate uproar and accusations of delusions of grandeur soon followed.

Another group of co-workers was slightly impressed by this "spam" and they decided to set up their own email newsletter with only some rumours and gossip but mostly good quality reference material. The difference between the two newsletters was that the newer one offered no promise of regular updates though because the staff had work to do of course so they could not guarantee that they would be available with some news updates as it all broke. Jack and Jim may have monitored everyone else 24/7 but others have a life to pursue and sent out their updates when they were good and ready to. It was just a newsletter after all and that is nothing important on the scale of things in life. Even critics of Jack and Jim said that they should get out more often and get a life, whenever the two criticised their rivals for not being as up to date even when weekly publications for example are one week behind. So the lack of a guarantee about timely information posting was mostly because the newbies were trying to gather good quality information and a little bureaucracy helped to ensure that they had a presentation with more than 80% correct spelling, grammatical and factual content where the other newsletter was widely criticised for being run by kids with no professionalism and a low percentage of correctness.

The two guys and some of their supporters had failed to understand what made their new rival tick. The mission of the newest newsletter on the block was to entertain, inform and educate and the emphasis was less on the "inform" part and more on the other two at different times of the year. At the peak time it was to entertain and any other time it was to educate. In addition to that they wanted to ensure that their professionalism and overall good quality of information would keep the complaints down to just a few trivial ones that many people would generally not care about if mentioned publicly. If Jack and Jim followed that model they would not have received a 50% complaint rate saying that their tabloid was mere garbage with some others saying that they loved the fictional component presented as the gospel truth. The guys did not take the regular criticism very well. When they included reader testimonials in their newsletters they were careful to edit out any negative ones. If anyone dared to criticise them publicly they would try in vain to shut them up. Plenty of people soon started to learn that the guys seemed to be treating them all with contempt and their hatred for the company and wild claims had developed into sheer arrogance such that their newsletter was no longer taken seriously at all.

After a retraction about Jack's imminent promotion appeared in the first newsletter on Tuesday morning people thought that the whole tabloid was just a joke. The retraction stated that it turned out to be a rumour started by the photo copier paper delivery guy. Even company publications containing news mentioned that the tabloid often bagged the company and the team leader of the writers of the tabloid. It had developed such a bad reputation that this started to reflect poorly on everyone doing similar things, deserved or not. The bad reputation of the pioneering newsletter was a sad indictment on the lower quality culture that had been fostered there. So the other team of newsletter producers meanwhile learnt their biggest lesson (not to take it too seriously).

They took a much more positive approach and limited their criticisms, of how boring the workplace is from week to week, to a reasonable minimum most of the time. In addition they regularly praised their fearless female team leader to the extent that it was almost bordering on sexual harassment. Sometimes too many compliments can be taken that way in politically correct societies. After some readers of the newsletter complained about some criticisms of the boredom seen in the company the staff decided to be more creative with their presentation of factual and satirical featurettes among other offerings. This was widely applauded and the positive changes were for the better while the original folk were still, it seems, sadly stuck in the Dark Ages. Well so it might seem to some. Regularly bagging something for example, just results in a bad reputation. Being a "carbon copy" of a popular UK offering (photos, interactive area, diary and more) and claiming that the interactive area is of "quality", just like the UK offering does is another way to develop a bad reputation some might say. Sometimes reputation does not matter to some, but to others it does!