BB revolves away its ratings

Eviction barely passes the 1m mark

Big Brother’s brand-new eviction format was finally tested last night, and the results were less than stellar.

The official figure from Oztam for the 7.30 Eviction show is 1.05 million viewers, giving it 11th place overall for the night. More significantly however is that Ten was beaten in its key 18-49 and 16-39 demographics.

The 6.30 Daily Show scored 848,000, well behind Seven and Nine.

The first Live Eviction for 2008 followed a very different format to previous years. Traditionally the first half-hour of the program would be used for catching up with the nominees and their families, followed by the eviction announcement just after 8.00pm and about half an hour with the evictee on the stage. This year, the first hour of the program was all about the Housemate voting and the setup of the eviction, which no longer climaxed with an announcement from the hosts and instead saw the nominees stepping into a bizarre and largely pointless revolving door. By the time Saxon finally reached the stage at the end of this convoluted process, there was only a short time left for his interview with the hosts.

What do you think – has the magic and suspense of the eviction been lost in the new format? Discuss it in our forums. So far, the response from our users is largely negative.

Thanks to Media Spy for the ratings figures.