SOCIAL MEDIA COVERAGE OF BIG BROTHER NIAJA SHOW OF 2018: A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF FACEBOOK, TWITTER AND INSTAGRAM FAN PAGES
ABSTRACT
This study sought to analyze social media coverage of Big Brother Naija show of 2020 with focus on the fan pages of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram handles. This study was anchored on the agenda setting theory and framing theories. The researchers utilized content analysis method in addressing the study.
Out of a total of 48, 176 posts on the fan pages of the three (3) social media handles (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram), composite sampling technique was used to arrive at a sample size of 200 posts. The instrument for data collection was code sheet. To ensure reliability of research instrument the pearson’s r was used to arrive at an inter coder reliability of 0.9, 0.8, 0.9, 0.7, and 0.9. Findings from data analysis revealed that several frames were used in social media coverage of BBN in the 2020 edition. Some of these frames include morality frame, nudity frame, and reality frame. However, nudity frame 87 (53.4%) posts was the highest frame used in social media coverage of BBN. It was also revealed that social media coverage of BBN was unfavourable, given that 83 (50.9%) post were unfavourable to the show. It can be said that the show enjoyed lots of criticism and negativities with regards to its activities.
INTRODUCTION
The advent of social media has redefined the concept of media consumers because of the room it creates for media consumers to also contribute in content development. The passive consumer therefore in conventional media are now active consumers on social media platforms, they consumer and also produce contents. Susan (2010) is of the opinion that as the social web has grown and tools like Twitter, Blogs, Facebook and YouTube have allowed communication to flow faster and farther than ever before; inevitably causing the world to shrink and real-time to be the expectation, people have changed. In simplest term, people have moved from being CONsumers to PROsumers with far more influence than ever before. The term “prosumer” has transformed from meaning “professional consumers” to meaning, “product and brand advocate”, rather than simply “consuming products, people are becoming the voices of those products and significantly impacting the success or failure of companies, products and brands, particularly through their involvement on the social web. No longer are businesses completely in control of their products, brands and messages. Today, consumers are in control. The leaders of this shift are the members of the social web: bloggers, microbloggers, forum posters, social networking participants.
This feature is what characterizes the social media handles of the Big Brother Naija (BBN) reality show of 2018. As the organizers of the program/reality show created fan pages on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook handles of the BBN. The essence of these fan pages is to enable the fans of roommates in the reality show to make comments and criticism of the activities of the housemates. Here, fans consume the contents generated by the organizers and also contribute their own contents. According to
Daniel (2016), the Big Brother ideology is traced to George Orwells novel, “Nineteen Eighty Four” which focuses on all round surveillance and the importance of facts and truths. This ideology monitors the nuance of people’s behaviour and infers their thoughts through an all-round surveillance (which can be a high definition remote camera sensor and display telescreen) by an invisible superior.
The Big Brother Naija reality show operates under the principle of one of the genres of reality shows called the “elimination game show”. In this case over twenty (20) to twenty-five (25) housemates are brought together for a period of three (3) months and gradually eliminated based on their activities in the house. The ideology of the organizers of the BBN is to ensure that housemates lives their normal life, while a Big Brother watches unnoticed.
Rebecca (2015) is of the view that reality shows are known for showing the most rational side of humanity, although some show crazy concepts that they will be willing to enjoy a 15minutes chance of fame. As Nigerians, the housemates are expected to exhibit the cultural disposition of the country and their ethnic affiliations if possible and uphold some level of morality. This is because reality entails being yourself, however some of these housemates appear to live a life of pretence, deceit and seem to exaggerate issues. These character attribute are what fuels comments, uploads and discussions on the fan page social media handle of these platforms. It is against this backdrop that this study sought to analyze social media coverage of the Big Brother Naija show of 2018 with focus on the fan page of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram handles.
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