The Life Of Big Brother

Whatever your views on Big Brother, whether you’re glued to it or can’t stand it, your students are likely to be talking about it.

That makes it a useful tool to get students talking about product life-cycles.

As Channel 4 release pictures of the inside of the house it’s clear that once again they are looking to prevent the show going into decline with a number of twists.

As the 10th series is about to start it might be a good time to put students in the shoes of the producers and ask them to come up with a plan for the 10th series.

How have Endemol, the company that produce the show, managed it’s life-cycle? Which tricks do they think have worked?

Then students could work in groups to propose a plan of how they would make it different. How would they keep people watching?

Of course all of this has to be done within the regulations, so it could even lead to a discussion about business ethics.

Finally, students could be asked to think about how long the product will continue to live for. Do they think it has a finite life?