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The current website for Big Brother on Channel 5, which gives information about the latest series.

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Whichever housemate was your fave, and whoever you were backing to win, you've got to admit our celebs this time round were a fascinating, hilarious, argumentative, creative, and generally great... More

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Big Brother fan site, which features news from the show, polls on who the viewers want to win and forums to discuss the programme.

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Big Brother | Celebrity BB UK | News Forum Pictures Polls | TiBB

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Big Brother & Celebrity Big Brother. Forum, pictures, polls & news for the UK TV show, the past BB & celebrity housemates & reality TV.

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Discusses voyeurism in big brother and nudity in episode 1.

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Article on Big Brother Racism controversy

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Channel 4 yesterday received an unprecedented, stinging rebuke from the media watchdog over its handling of the Celebrity Big Brother race row that resulted in more than 54,000 complaints.

Ofcom concluded that Channel 4 committed a "serious error of judgment", breaching its broadcasting code on four occasions arising from the alleged racist bullying of Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty. It raised concerns that the broadcaster was unable to view the incidents in their wider context and was unable to deal with the way complaints escalated into an international incident.

It has also emerged that further instances of racial abuse, including a rhyme that implied the word "Paki", were not flagged up straight away by the programme's producers and remained hidden from the public when they were.

Channel 4 will be forced to air three apologies ahead of programmes in next week's new Big Brother, and has promised to tighten up editorial procedures and improve communication with viewers.

Although Channel 4 escaped a fine, the judgment could have severe repercussions. Yesterday's ruling will be seized on by critics who feel the broadcaster has lost its way and, with the premium phone line scandal, it will harden attitudes in Whitehall when some Treasury officials are looking afresh at privatising Channel 4.

The regulator said Channel 4 was not wrong to air the alleged racist comments from Jade Goody, Danielle Lloyd and Jo O'Meara but that it had failed to contextualise or justify the inclusion. Channel 4 had mishandled the material on three separate occasions - when the housemates discussed cooking in India, when Lloyd told Shetty to "fuck off home" and when Goody referred to the eventual winner of the show as "Shilpa Poppadom".

It also emerged yesterday that there were various other, unbroadcast incidents of racism that were not immediately referred to senior Endemol staff or Channel 4 executives. They included a late night "limerick game" between O'Meara, Lloyd, Goody and her boyfriend Jack Tweedy in which the use of the word "Paki" was implied but not said. In the others, Goody speculated on whether Lloyd used "the p-word" and Goody referred to the Bollywood actress as "Shilpa Pashwa whoever you fucking are" and "Shilpa Poppadom", an insult that she repeated on air the next day.

When the "limerick" footage was passed on to Channel 4 two days later, producers gave O'Meara and Tweedy a formal warning in the diary room.

Channel 4's own review, ordered by its board, also identified a number of failings. It failed to deal effectively with the public's concerns or recognise that offence could be caused even if not intentional. "Channel 4 appeared to be somehow condoning the behaviour of some of the housemates because interventions were felt to be too late or insufficiently forceful," it said.

Ofcom's judgment will increase the pressure on Channel 4's chief executive, Andy Duncan, who announced a "10-point plan" to act on recommendations from the internal review. They included a new intervention and referral policy to ensure potential problems are fed up the chain of command more quickly and a stronger senior Channel 4 presence at the Big Brother studios in Elstree. It will appoint a senior welfare producer to monitor the housemates. The broadcaster also recognised it was not equipped to deal with the way the row escalated. As thousands of complaints poured in, it overshadowed a trip to India by Godon Brown and provoked questions in the Commons. Altogether it sparked a total of 44,500 complaints to Ofcom and more than 10,000 to Channel 4 directly.

Mr Duncan admitted that broadcasters had to start thinking of viewers as "real people rather than ratings".

Channel 4 said it would appoint a viewers' editor, reintroduce a monthly right to reply programme and institute a new "early warning system" to alert senior management whenever there was a spike in the number of complaints. It has also appointed consultants to advise on PR strategies. Mr Duncan was criticised for not speaking out earlier and chairman Luke Johnson refused to discuss the issue on Radio 4's Today.

"In a 24/7 media environment we didn't act quickly enough," admitted Mr Duncan, who said he had not considered it a resigning issue for anyone. "Mistakes were made ... We're determined to draw a line under this." The Commission for Racial Equality will be keeping a close eye on the new series. "Big Brother provided a shocking reflection of our society," a spokesman said.
Complaints, responses and rulings Date broadcast: January 5
Complaint That Jade Goody, her boyfriend Jack Tweedy and her mother Jackiey Budden were introduced to stir up racial tension.

Channel 4 defence The introduction of the Goody clan had been conceived for the previous non-celebrity series but held over until this one.

Ofcom verdict Not in breach - "no significance" attached to their introduction.
January 9
Complaint Budden refers to Shilpa Shetty as "the Indian".

Defence A generic reference to her country of origin and personality, rather than race, related.

Verdict Resolved - Davina McCall failed to challenge her properly, but in light of C4's promised changes no further action required.
January 13
Complaint Danielle Lloyd calling Shilpa Shetty a "dog" was racially motivated.

Defence No evidence it was racially motivated and it was important for viewers to see Lloyd's "real character"

Verdict Not in breach - unpleasant, but no so offensive it needed wider context.
January 15
Complaint Danielle Lloyd and Jo O'Meara, discuss an under-cooked chicken, inferring that was why people in India were thin and discussed whether they ate with their fingers.

Defence Comments should be viewed in context and the pair were right to be concerned about food hygiene.

Verdict In breach - other events in the house should have alerted C4 to the potential for offence.
January 17
Complaint Following the row, Lloyd says Shetty should "fuck off home" and can't speak English properly.

Defence It "appeared unlikely" she meant it literally and was not motivated by racism. She was challenged.

Verdict In breach - should have put the issues to Lloyd more explicitly and made it clear to viewers that racism would not be tolerated.
January 18
Complaint Goody refers to Shetty as "Shilpa Poppadom".

Defence The comment caused concern and led to an intervention by Big Brother and Goody assured them it was not racist and apologised.

Verdict In breach - in its first discussion, Big Brother did not put the matter of racism to Goody. It was also repeated on a pre-watershed version of the show.
Topics

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Channel 4 yesterday received an unprecedented, stinging rebuke from the media watchdog over its handling of the Celebrity Big Brother race row that resulted in more than 54,000 complaints. Ofcom concluded that Channel 4 committed a "serious error of judgment", breaching its broadcasting code on four occasions arising from the alleged racist bullying of Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty.

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Article criticises Big Brother and its impact on participants and how the show can cause psychological problems.

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THe Show Big Brother, the "social experiment" that mixes voyeurism with prime-time TV, is to come under scrutiny itself after a complaint that two psychologists on the hit programme have broken their ethical code.

THe Show Big Brother, the "social experiment" that mixes voyeurism with prime-time TV, is to come under scrutiny itself after a complaint that two psychologists on the hit programme have broken their ethical code.

The British Psychological Society confirmed yesterday that it is investigating allegations that two university professors are guilty of professional misconduct by involving themselves with the Channel 4 production.

The move follows a claim that Professor Peter Collett, of Oxford University, and Professor Geoffrey Beattie, of Manchester University, are legitimising the "exploitation" of the programme's contestants. An "investigatory committee" will now be set up by the society to decide whether there is any substance to the complaint.

Both academics appear on the show once a week to offer on-camera analysis of the behaviour of the 10 "captive" contestants in the show whose every movement is recorded by security cameras.

Professor Collett also acts as a consultant to the programme, providing general psychological guidance to the producers, Bazal. Neither of the two psychologists has any direct involvement with the competitors.

The 10-week series, which began last month, follows the daily life of five men and five women in a secure communal living space, with one contestant being evicted every week.

Viewers saw their first eviction on Friday as Sada Walkington, 27, lost her chance to win the £70,000 to be awarded to the last person left in the secret north London compound.

The programme has achieved large audiences, in excess of 5 million viewers on some nights, despite a panning from the critics.

But a formal letter of complaint from a Glasgow sociologist that the programme could ultimately damage its contestants is threatening to tarnish the show's carefully constructed appeal.

Dr David Miller, research director at the media research iunstitute at Stirling University, said: "What we are seeing night after night is a game show, not a serious attempt to explore human nature.

"What's more, the participants are themselves being placed under enormous stress that could lead to long-termdifficulties. These two professors are lending credibility toa crass and exploitative gimmick." Dr Miller said he believed the two academics had committed a "serious breach of ethical behaviour" and broken the code of conduct set out by the society in 1985. The society declined to comment on the details of the complaint but confirmed it would investigate.

During the run-up to last week's eviction vote by viewers and competitors, there was clear evidence of the stress on Sada and another participant, Caroline, after they were shortlisted to leave. Caroline was seen lying on her bed crying, while Sada vowed to leave in any event.

Professor Beattie expressed surprise at the complaint. "I'm astonished at the basis for the complaint," he said. "It's like saying it is a breach of ethics to interpret a politician's hand gestures. I have no direct contact with the participants."

Bazal Productions, the company making Big Brother, highlighted the safeguards built in to protect the participants.

A spokesman said: "Each of the contestants has been psychologically screened and they are fully aware of what Big Brother involves. There is a team of counsellors and a psychiatrist available at all times. We have set up a stringent safety net that many other programmes lack."

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Psychologists in trouble for 'Big Brother'

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THe Show Big Brother, the "social experiment" that mixes voyeurism with prime-time TV, is to come under scrutiny itself after a complaint that two psychologists on the hit programme have broken their ethical code.

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Article about sexual activity in Big Brother

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Last updated at 14:42 04 June 2004

Michelle and Stuart may have become the first housemates to have sex live on Big Brother.

The pair have flirted all week and finally got into bed together last night.

All viewers could see was movement under the duvet - accompanied by whimpers of pleasure from Michelle.

The wannabe glamour model also asked Stuart whether he liked her piercing - said to be in such an intimate place that even Big Brother doesn't know where it is.

She began by saying: "You can just lie there if you want and I'll cuddle you."

But then the 23-year-old Geordie took matters into her own hands and climbed on top of him.

Afterwards she told psychology student Stuart: "Don't be embarrassed. Have a squeeze of my bum."

The pair then fell asleep in each other's arms.

Earlier in the evening, 23-year-old Michelle had stripped off and gone topless during a boozy game of Spin the Bottle.

After an hour together on the sofa, she and Stuart retired to bed.

Michelle later claimed she and Stuart had not had full sex but had done "pretty much everything else".

The only thing that stopped her was the presence of the Big Brother cameras.

"I feel a bit rude," she told Marco this morning.

"We didn't have sex but we pretty much did everything else."

Marco squealed: "No way!" and Michelle went on: "I think he's shy. But I get what I want, you know what I mean?"

Asked why she had not had sex, she explained: "Because of the camera."

"He's a sexy hunk of a man, isn't he?" she added.

"He is so attractive," agreed Marco. "This is the craziest house of all time, I swear."

Michelle and Stuart were last to get up this morning and the other housemates were already debating whether they had gone all the way - half of them had been awake in the same room while the action was taking place.

Playboy TV has offered £50,000 each to the first couple to have sex in the house.

When a grinning Stuart eventually walked into the lounge, Kitten asked him: "Is that a £50,000 smile?"

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Michelle and Stuart may have become the first housemates to have sex live on Big Brother. The pair have flirted all week and finally got into bed together last night. All viewers could see was movement under the duvet - accompanied by whimpers of pleasure from Michelle. So did they or didn't they?

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Article about Vanessa feltz and her mental problems in the house

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Article about Ofcom putting sanctions on Big Brother because of a breach of broadcasting code. - Racism

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Ofcom's decision to force Channel 4 to air a series of apologies over the alleged racist bullying in Celebrity Big Brother is an unprecedented move.

It is the first time Ofcom has required a public service broadcaster to take a "statutory direction", forcing them to air the apologies, which will be shown before the opening episode of Big Brother 8 next Wednesday, the re-versioned repeat the next morning and the first eviction show.

In its ruling published today, Ofcom said that in coming to its decision that Channel 4 had broken its broadcasting code it took into account unseen footage from Celebrity Big Brother, which showed some of the housemates discussing using the word "Paki" in a limerick.

This footage was filmed on Tuesday January 16 and logged by the Celebrity Big Brother production team, employed by Endemol subsidiary Brighter Pictures, but not broadcast or referred to anyone at Channel 4.

Later, on January 20, Jack Tweedy and Jo O'Meara were summoned to the diary room and given formal warnings about the incident.

The diary room scenes were also not broadcast but transcripts of what took place were handed to Ofcom by Channel 4 and have been published by the broadcaster today.

Viewers did see the infamous row between Jade Goody and Shilpa Shetty and the three remarks that caused the most offence - about cooking in India by O'Meara, transmitted on January 15; a "fuck off home" comment regarding Shetty by Danielle Lloyd, transmitted on January 17; and Goody using the words "Shilpa poppadom", transmitted on January 18 and 19.

Although the incidents involving the limericks and the later formal warnings were logged, they were not broadcast and so could not have breached the broadcasting code.

Channel 4 said it was not made aware of the limerick incident until "several days after it occured".

The broadcaster later denied that the additional material existed, when the Sun ran a story on February 1 based on what the paper said was a Celebrity Big Brother production note it had obtained.

But it appears this incident may have contributed to the tough sanction imposed by Ofcom today.

"In deciding whether to impose a sanction, Ofcom has taken into account, in addition to the incidents broadcast, this footage from the house which was not transmitted," Ofcom said.

"The events from this untransmitted footage occurred before the broadcast of two of the incidents (one of which was broadcast twice) which Ofcom has found to be in breach of the code," the regulator added.

"This material included conversations between housemates which were instructive of the relationships, tensions and attitudes in the house at this particular time and were logged as 'racist' at the time by Brighter Pictures, the producer."

Ofcom added: "Channel 4 was not aware of this material at the relevant time and therefore was not able to take account of it when making its editorial decisions as to how to handle the broadcast of these two incidents.

"Channel 4 has submitted that this was due to a breakdown in communications between itself and Brighter Pictures, which the broadcaster considers resulted from a failure by the producer to follow established procedures and therefore draw the material to Channel 4's immediate attention.

"Whether this was the case or not, this does not excuse Channel 4 from its obligations under its licence to comply with the code."

Channel 4 said: "Ofcom's adjudication refers to untransmitted material supplied by Channel 4 to the regulator - this footage, from a short period in the house late at night on Tuesday 16th January 2007, was not broadcast and therefore could not be in breach of Ofcom's code," the broadcaster added.

"Nevertheless, the footage was cited by Ofcom as evidence of compliance failings on Channel 4's behalf because its existence was not brought to the channel's attention by the production team at Endemol until several days after it had occurred.

"The full untransmitted exchanges from that evening were only uncovered by Channel 4's own investigations after the series had ended."

Andy Duncan, the Channel 4 chief executive, added: "It's a matter of regret that we and senior managers at Endemol weren't aware of these conversations immediately they occurred - as soon as we were made aware of them we ensured that the relevant housemates were reprimanded.

"While Ofcom's investigation was ongoing it was not appropriate to publish this material, but we are publishing a transcript today to end speculation about these conversations."

Channel 4's general handling of the race row is also condemned by Ofcom.

"What is essential for compliance with the code is the way in which such material is transmitted by the broadcaster," the regulator said.

"Accordingly, in considering whether Channel 4 has breached the code in this instance, Ofcom's starting point is not that material which is potentially offensive or harmful has been transmitted, but whether such material has been appropriately handled by Channel 4."

· To contact the MediaGuardian newsdesk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 7239 9857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 7278 2332.

· If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".

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Ofcom makes landmark ruling over Big Brother

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Ofcom's decision to force Channel 4 to air a series of apologies over the alleged racist bullying in Celebrity Big Brother is an unprecedented move. It is the first time Ofcom has required a public service broadcaster to take a "statutory direction", forcing them to air the apologies, which will be shown before the opening episode of Big Brother 8 next Wednesday, the re-versioned repeat the next morning and the first eviction show.

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Soon it will all be over. Next Tuesday, the nation will decide whether John James, the handsome but peevish Australian, or Sam Pepper, the goofy prankster, or jolly Josie, the farm girl turned MC, or indeed somebody quite unforeseen is the housemate who should win the prize money of £50,000 plus a brief sojourn in the national limelight. And with that, Big Brother 11 will be over - the last-ever series - and an era will have come to an end.

It's an era, however, in which the wider meaning of Big Brother - in the Orwellian sense - has embedded itself in our national life, in ways of which we have only gradually become aware. In the last decade, we have become the most surveyed, monitored, CCTVd, inspected, followed, targeted, filed and cross-referenced society in western Europe. We have endured the invasion of our privacy to a degree that would once have seemed possible only in science fiction. We have become the unwitting targets of governments, banks and the police, along with a host of unnamed commercial concerns who sell data about us to advertisers on the internet. We can hardly conduct a single financial transaction, or make a single gesture of communication online, without it entering a databank and adding to an already considerable "file" that defines our identities as consumers, frequent flyers, early adopters, porn-downloaders, credit risks or potential criminals. Meanwhile, we live blissfully unaware that a shadowy assessing authority is out there, telling the world a combination of truth and lies about who we are.

We might be forgiven for feeling paranoid about this. But paranoia is actively encouraged by governments or organisations that like to wield complete power over the lives of its citizens. It's like being brought up Catholic and told that God is watching everything you do, while your conscience constantly patrols what you're thinking for evidence of inappropriateness. It's like the chap in Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore who, when I asked him why it was that the train stations were so immaculately free from litter, graffiti and thugs, tapped his head sagely and said: "It's the policeman who lives in your head."

George Orwell invented the term "Big Brother" in 1947 when he was writing Nineteen Eighty-Four, his classic evocation of a socialist hell in which a government strives to own the minds of its people, as well as change its country's history as it suits them. According to the novelist and polymath Anthony Burgess, "Big Brother" began with a billboard advertisement that Orwell would have seen during the Second World War - an ad for Bennett's Educational correspondence courses. It featured a photograph of the kindly-looking proprietor offering prospective clients advice, under the phrase "Let me be your father." When Mr Bennett died, his son took over the business, employed a photograph of himself looking stern and imposing, and changed the shout line to "Let me be your big brother". Between this and the memory of the posters of Lord Kitchener from the First World War, pointing a minatory finger at the viewer and intoning the words, "Your Country Needs YOU", Orwell had his perfect image of benevolent dictatorship - of a doctrinaire government telling its subjects that it will run your life for your own good.

In Nineteen Eighty-Four, Big Brother is the notional ruler of Oceania, one of the world's three superpowers, which wages almost perpetual war on the other two, Eurasia and Eastasia - or so they tell the people, in an attempt to keep them in a state of cowed alarm. Big Brother is the party hero, leader, guardian and originator of the Revolution, and a father-figure to his people. In the novel, at the end of the daily Two-Minute Hate, when the proletariat screams abuse at the televised face of the international villain Goldstein, Big Brother's face appears and the crowds chant "B-B" in a slow, rapturous chorus. "Partly it was a sort of hymn to the wisdom and majesty of Big Brother," wrote Orwell, "but still more it was an act of self-hypnosis, a deliberate drowning of consciousness by means of rhythmic noise."

The TV show, which started life in the Netherlands in 1999, began life as a game of survival and popularity under the eyes of total-surveillance cameras. Would people crumple under the pressure of being watched 24 hours a day, while they slept, ate, chatted, argued, picked their noses, flirted, fornicated and washed themselves? Would being cooped up with a dozen strangers of different ages and walks of life, lead to exciting clashes of temperament? The prospect of winning a large cash prize was supposed to be a spur to good behaviour, as the housemates strove to avoid being evicted from the house by a combination of peer hatred and viewer dislike.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can see that, for a decade, we've engaged in a shameless combination of voyeurism, lab-rat inspection, prurience and moral condemnation, as we've watched a Bedlam of egomaniacs, exhibitionists, dunderheads, sex fiends, liars, fantasists, mentally unstable and existentially challenged victims chat and bitch and canoodle with each other, perform degrading tasks and lay their lives and their (sometimes toxic, sometimes pathetic) personalities bare for our enjoyment. How proud we must be of ourselves.

In the early days, the nation was gripped; viewers talked about the housemates as if they were friends, or acquaintances, or were established stars with fascinating lives.

There was "Nasty Nick" who passed secret messages to his fellow housemates until he was exposed by the first-ever winner, Craig (memorably described by an online commentator as "poncing about as if he's got his white van keys stuck up his arse") and Brian the gay Ulsterman and airline trolley dolly with a tongue that could clip a hedge, and Nadia the Madeiran transsexual who liked to wear six-inch heels in the shower ("Go Nads!" her supporters used to shout ambiguously outside the BB House), and Pete the Tourette's sufferer with the engaging facial tics and the uncontrollable swearing, and, among a crowded field of ditzy young women, the birdbrained Helen Adams who tended to vocalise any thought that entered her head, including the immortal: "I like blinking, I do!" There was a certain dental nurse from Bermondsey who pronounced East Anglia "East Angular" and shouted, during a striptease drinking game: "Me kebab's showing!" Fans will recall with sweaty palms the astonishingly rude series five, in which a 24-year-old Zimbabwean cardiac nurse called Makosi had sex in a foaming Jacuzzi with a Geordie dancer called Anthony and coolly asked Big Brother next day for a morning-after pill, and a half-Kuwaiti, half-Polish woman called Kinga pleasured herself in the garden with an empty rosé wine bottle, a coup de théâtre later voted Most Shocking Moment in the show's history.

The most genuinely shocking thing about Big Brother, however, is how casually we accepted its dubious strategies. Each year, we tacitly agreed to watch a dozen or so strangers being manipulated by an all-seeing authority, forced to dress up and make idiots of themselves, denied food and drink on a whim, then plied with drink in the hope that they'd behave without inhibitions, and forced to shower in their underwear and defecate without locks on the doors. Did we know that they had their luggage inspected, as though by HM Customs, and weren't allowed to bring watches (so they wouldn't know the time when waking in the pitch-dark bedroom) or pens or other writing materials, including eyebrow pencil? Did we know (or care) that when technicians came onto the set to make adjustments, the housemates were "locked down" in their bedrooms, with the curtains drawn but with a klaxon sounding in case anybody fell asleep? General Pinochet would have nodded approvingly at such firm arrangements. And as for the housemates' conversations - did we realise that the nightly "highlights" of the day's action were heavily edited, to show certain housemates in a good, and some in a bad, light? That actual "reality" was kept at arm's length in this reality TV show? If we witnessed a "live stream" of genuine, as-it-happens action from the BB kitchen or living-room, the Endemol producers carefully used the sounds of birds twittering to drown out any deviation from the kind of chat they wanted us to hear. Did no alarm sound in our heads, saying, They're stopping us hearing what these people are really talking about ...

Along with the censorship and manipulation, we might have felt uncomfortable about our Peeping Tom role, as contestants succumbed to lust and, in 2004, Michelle Bass and Stuart Wilson, after some prolonged negotiation, disappeared under a table to have sex, protected from view by a single sheet. The nation's bookmakers had already offered odds on who would participate in the first "Big Brother bonk".

Some viewers wondered about the breezy presentation of housemates with mental illness. We were encouraged to regard Pete Bennett, the Tourette's syndrome sufferer, as a boyish charmer with some odd affectations of behaviour, and Nikki Grahame - a disturbed anorexic with mental health issues and one suicide bid behind her - as an "feisty" and argumentative young woman who ranted hysterically (but so amusingly) when denied mineral water, rather than as someone on the edge of cracking up.

What started life as a game show about charm and interaction had become something else: the spectacle of handicapped or unhinged people disporting themselves for the amusement of bored and prurient viewers.

Occasionally, critical voices were raised by ex-participants. "I think reality TV programmes do a lot of damage," said Vanessa Feltz, who starred in the first Celebrity Big Brother. "Nothing prepares you for the scrutiny and incarceration and worrying what people might think of you and trying to survive all at once. Believe me it was extremely intense and a most unnerving thing." Kinga Karolczak, she of the rosé wine bottle, told the press that she had been forced by the programme makers to behave outrageously and was plied with drink and offered free cigarettes if she agreed to walk around the BB house topless.

Germaine Greer, who did most to alert the public about the reality of the show, wrote that "the whole point of Big Brother is that he is a bully", and itemised the levels of dirt and degradation to which the contestants, including herself, were subjected. She described the lavatory conditions and the "combination of cruelty and incompetence" that induced bladder and bowel malfunctions - not to mention the vomiting, the incubation of bacteria, the botulism, the shivering and night-sweats. "As reality television series multiply across the networks," she concluded, "they will become increasingly sadistic and prurient. The only way forward for ordeal by television is down, which in [Orwellian] Newspeak is of course up, towards maximum exploitation of vulnerable people."

Five years later, that hasn't happened. Instead of ramping up the exploitation, Big Brother is quietly dying away. A combination of dull housemates and viewer disaffection has affected viewing figures. "Is anyone still watching that thing?" is an often-heard question. But something else has happened to us in the last decade, something loosely connected to Big Brother and its queasy record of manipulation, histrionics and boredom. We have become inveterate watchers of each other.

Just as BB contestants once used the Diary Room to confide their inner feelings to a notional superior (and judge of their actions), millions now offer their daily, sometimes hourly, two-penn'orth of news and wisdom to the outside world via Facebook and Twitter. Once, we'd come home from work and watch BB housemates cooking dinner and worrying about how long they should cook the pasta. It wasn't great drama, but we watched it anyway. Now we tweet each other with similarly gripping news of what we're having for supper and how we're cooking it. No specialised area of human life, no tiny detail of behaviour, is now so trivial that we won't report it to each other with high seriousness, as if it were a dispatch from a war zone.

And in the intervening years, we've quietly become a nation of housemates, endlessly spied on by authorities and by businesses. Today, if you call 999 to report a crime, you'll have your details instantly logged on a secret database that mingles the names of criminals with those of victims and members of the public, and your name will be kept there for 15 years, practically begging to be involved in a disastrous mix-up. Today, if you open a pub, the police will try to install CCTV in it to keep tabs on the drinkers. If you, the landlord, complain that you don't like this intrusion upon your customers' privacy, you could lose your licence. Other kinds of surveillance don't involve the police, but are just as creepy. Try buying any goods online today, and you'll find yourself pursued around the Internet by advertisers who know your details and buying preferences remarkably well, because they've bought them from monitoring agencies.

The most alarming fall-out from Big Brother, however, is that it has ushered in a surveillance society, to which everyone contributes. Earlier this year, a comedian friend reported that, on his journey home from a day at the BBC in London, a total stranger on the train pulled out his iPhone and showed him that his every move, every meeting, every conversation, practically every comfort break, had been followed by Twitter users. They'd been keeping an eye out for my friend when his train arrived at Waterloo; on the Tube to Shepherd's Bush; in the BBC car park; in the BBC canteen. I wrote about it - and soon learned from other half-famous people with similar complaints. One had looked himself up on a Twitter site and found: "My movements over the last five days, and that of my wife and child as we went to and from Brighton for three days of work, were all intimately tracked, as was our weekend in London. Two different tweets from the same London café observed my three-year-old mistakenly taking another child's milk bottle from a pram ... "

Public recognition has brought with it a culture of surveillance that's close to stalking. Once, celebrities might have worried about journalists and paparazzi. Now, everyone's a reporter and broadcaster and they can say anything about anyone, without rules. That's the real legacy of Big Brother. The surveyed have become the surveyors. "Them" has become "Us." Ten years of watching human guinea pigs and lab-rats at close quarters, living out their three-month imprisonment in a prefabricated hell, has given us a taste for prying into each other's lives and dramatising the trivial details of our own, while making everything public on electronic screens. And while this is going on, we're blithely ignoring the steady erosion of our privacy by government, police and business.

Perhaps it is part of the deal you make about living in a surveillance society - that eventually, you embrace all its incarnations. Perhaps, like Winston Smith at the end of Orwell's masterpiece, we've finally given in. We love Big Brother.

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Big Brother: the series that made surveillance acceptable

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Soon it will all be over. Next Tuesday, the nation will decide whether John James, the handsome but peevish Australian, or Sam Pepper, the goofy prankster, or jolly Josie, the farm girl turned MC, or indeed somebody quite unforeseen is the housemate who should win the prize money of £50,000 plus a brief sojourn in the national limelight.

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Article about 'Nasty Nick' cheating controversy and removal from the house

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Big Brother contestant "Nasty Nick" Bateman has been disqualified from the Channel 4 show after his housemates found out about his scheming.

The station said he had been evicted at 1700 BST on Thursday for "persistent infringement" of the show's rules, after it was discovered he had been trying to manipulate the surveillance gameshow's nomination process.

He had been writing notes and showing them to fellow contestants in an attempt to influence their voting intentions.

Big Brother rules state that a disqualified contestant must be replaced, although producers have not yet decided whether to reprieve Craig and Nichola - who were due for eviction - because of his cheating.

Programme bosses have booked dozens of hotel rooms around the south of England in an attempt to keep Nick's location secret.

He was whisked away from the east London house in a blacked-out car, as five others sped off in separate directions to throw people off the scent.

Ten contestants moved into a specially-constructed house in east London last month, watched by cameras and with no access to the outside world.

Apology

Each week, the housemates nominate two of their number for eviction, with the public deciding which one should get the boot.

At the end of the series, three will remain, with the public voting for a winner, who receives 70,000.

The show's rules forbid talking about nominations and tactical voting.

A statement from Channel 4 said: "Having earlier issued both a verbal and a written warning to Nick and all other contestants making it clear they faced eviction if they continued to contravene the rules about vote-rigging, it was decided Nick's continued presence in the house was no longer tenable."

Upon leaving the house, Nick told the housemates: "I did it for selfish reasons. I made a mistake and I apologise - it wasn't personal.

'Enjoyable six weeks'

"It's been a very enjoyable six weeks and I wish all of you the best for the remaining four, five weeks here and the rest of your lives.

"I hope you all get what you want and have a happy life thereafter. I'm very sorry.

"I'm going through a lot of pain right now which I deserve, but we all have emotions so hopefully some of you will understand in days to come."

Earlier, he called the house "a very competitive environment".

"I've worked in a very aggressive environment where people will stitch you up to further their own careers," he said.

Although viewers were fully aware of his plotting, he had built up the trust of his fellow contestants.

He also admitted to lying after he claimed he had lost a wife in a car crash, and has already received verbal and written warnings for his conduct.

When the housemates found out what he was up to, they accused him of being "sick".

'Sick'

Liverpudlian builder Craig told him: "I just thought you were genuine. I was misled and you made me look a fool.

"You're making it hard for me to believe what anyone else has said."

Nick admitted he had shown the names he had written down to two other contestants.

Craig and Bolton textile worker Nichola have been nominated this week, and late on Wednesday night Thomas let slip to Craig that Nick had voted against him.

Craig told Darren, and they then searched Nick's suitcase, and found his papers.

Nick conceded: "I've done something wrong."

The contestants agreed that they could not trust him, and Melanie said: "I think you should walk."

Darren said: "No-one is going to trust you - you might as well take your stuff and go."

Nichola said: "I've nothing good to say about the programme. They've made rules which have been broken."

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BBC News | ENTERTAINMENT | Big Brother throws out 'Nasty Nick'

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Big Brother contestant "Nasty Nick" Bateman has been disqualified from the Channel 4 show after his housemates found out about his scheming. The station said he had been evicted at 1700 BST on Thursday for "persistent infringement" of the show's rules, after it was discovered he had been trying to manipulate the surveillance gameshow's nomination process.