It is the absolute intent... intent... Um, has anyone here done law?

Year after year BBBA fires off piles of outraged emails pouting "make this stop or I will pursue matters further" in an attempt to intimidate not the competitors and critics of BBBA themselves, but the host of the material. What we call scaredy cat tactics rather than scare tactics. You know, too wussy to take on the authors so try and cut off their supply instead. It's trademark BBBA legalthink.

Now, I wouldn't dare suggest this name-withheld stab at shutting down the fan site Behindbigbrother.net, forwarded by the hosting yforum administrator, is in any way connected to BBBA just because it's nearly word for word to those failed firey emails aimed to shut me up. Just sayin'...

Update:

Well you could knock me over with a Julian Clarey tutu. And now we know the real gripe behind the name-no-longer-withheld stab above: sneaky multiple-page threads!

Hit the link again.

April FOOLS indeed.

Someone ought to let them know over at BBBA that April Fool's jokes only work if they are funny or clever. This one is neither and sets the "lame" meter at somewhere between just plain stupid and outright cringeworthy.

Vibes sets the 'gag' up with a Big Brother auditionee named "Rick" who has recorded video footage of the audition process on his mobile phone.

"The video shows some of the group interviews and strenuous activities producers make potential housemates go through for a spot in the house."

It links to a YouTube clip of Rick Astley singing "Never gonna give you up".

Side-splitting, eh.

Update

Thanks to commenter "anon" for explaining that dud. Nerdy gamesters and squinty-eyed porn freaks of course got it in one.

Beam us up, Scotty

Readers of this blog will remember that last year we seriously questioned BBBA's bizarre boast of 19,000 members.

Throughout the 2007 year Vibes and co stubbornly defended that stat, insisting that a regular "purge" is carried out and there are indeed no redundant users. None.

So what I want to know is, what happened between last July and March of this year? Where did an entire town of 11,000 "members" go during the off season?

And what is to become of the remaining 8000 inactive, er "members"?

Yes, Virginia, there is an alternative

If the pre-season of Big Brother 2008 is anything to go by we can expect more than the usual dumpster of nastiness from the boys at BBBA.

The story so far: The fan site Big Brother Chaos is back this year with a newly launched Big Brother forum. It immediately came under sniper fire from both BBBA admin and aghast BBBA forumers (how dare they open a forum!). That assault continued for a week or so until Vibes and co discovered they had yet more competition. The troops were yanked out of Chaos and a precision aim set on Behindbigbrother.net .

Behindbigbrother.net (note the .net) is the brainchild of two victims of the broadbanned, our-way-or-the-doorway fist at BBBA. It is a new fan site and alternative forum that

...evolved from a need for a liberal and tolerant environment for forum contributors who are in interested in Big Brother... We aim to provide a forum which allows you freedom to express yourself without fear of reprisal from admin and moderators.

And good on them, too.

But no one could have imagined the sheer force that would be employed by the monopoly-mad mental midgets. BBBA admin - admin - arrived at BBB.net en masse armed with spam, vile, vile pornography, wild accusations, and coersion and threats to BBBA members who joined the site. Vibes and co became so desperate to stop any word of BBB.net they actually stooped to censoring on their site the words "behindbigbrother.net" - even within their members' personal messaging system. Read the whole story here .

I wish all success to the two new Big Brother 08 fan sites and encourage everyone to support them. Regimes are just so last year.

And Vibes? Welcome to the machine!