Big Brother is what Orwell called the government in his book “1984”. Like a big brother it keeps an eye on you, but it did it with cameras which were everywhere, even in your house.
Big Brother is also game show on television. In America it is on CBS in the summers three nights a week. It is now in its seventh year. Big Brother started in the Netherlands and has spread to 70 countries.
In Big Brother a dozen or so strangers are brought together to live in a big house cut off from the outside world. Each week a houseguest is voted out: two are put up for possible eviction: the one who gets the most votes is turned out. The last houseguest to remain wins the prize. In America the prize is $500,000 (44,000 crowns). That is more than ten years’ pay for most people.
What makes it like Orwell’s Big Brother is that there are cameras everywhere in the house recording all that goes on. The best bits are put on television. On the Internet you can see yet more, like on YouTube or the live feed on the CBS site.
Like Shakespeare or a good Godfather film, it is a great study in human nature: good against evil, knowing who to trust and who is lying, choosing whether to take the moral high road or be a snake and take the low road, choosing between helping your friends or looking out for yourself. It is all there.
The main rules:
- Head of Household (HOH): a game is held, some sort of physical challenge or a game of memory and wits. The winner becomes the Head of Household. The Head of Household gets the biggest room in the house and a private bathroom. He (or she) is the one who names which two to put up for the eviction vote.
- Power of Veto (POV): Later another game is held. The winner of this gets the Power of Veto: he can, if he wants, save one of the two guests that have been put up for eviction. If he does save one of them, then the HOH must pick someone else to put up for eviction.
- Eviction Vote: the guests vote for who will be turned out of the house. The two put up for eviction do not vote. The HOH votes only to break a tie.
The process repeats every week.
When only two guests are left, the last seven guests to leave the house vote for the winner. That makes it important to keep your friends in the house as long as possible.
One of the guests is brought back later through an online vote by viewers.
Big Brother is different from country to country. These are the American rules, but the idea is the same wherever you go.
See also:
- Big Brother updates – do not wait for the show — find out now what is going on now. Someone who watches the live feed writes about the latest.
- Dreamers’s cuts on YouTube, where you can find much more. It is better than the live feed because they cut out all the boring bits.
- Blogs which comment on the show, like that of Angel Cohn who does one for “TV Guide”.
- The Evil Dr Will – my own take on the winner of season two and current houseguest this season.
- Big Brother All Stars – the seventh season
- television
- Orwell
- crowns
Abagond 
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