BIGG BOSS TAMIL – SOCIAL LISTENING RESEARCH

This social media research done by Bleap Research Team aims to answer various questions pertaining to the controversial and hugely popular Reality TV show Bigg Boss – Tamil currently on air on Star Vijay TV.

1. How does audience feel about this program? Do they think it’s any other entertainment show or do they view as responsible for spoiling Tamil culture?.
2. Which protagonists of this show are popular and for what reasons? Oviya? Gayathri? Arav? Sakhthi? Other Contestants? Kamal Hasan?.
3. Whats the audience mood and feeling about who should win the show?.
4. What can be the possible social impact of Bigg Boss on conservative Tamil culture? Is it lasting?.

Research Methodology

1. We used social listening tools to shortlist various social media channels and pages which have substantial Social chatter on Bigg Boss and its contestants. We found over 100 such pages/ handles where the conversation was significant, active and regular.
2. We did primary research in terms of analysing the comments on social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Youtube. We poured over 600 individual comments on a random basis to create conversation clusters.
3. We also spoke to a few regular viewers of this show using a discussion guide. This validated our findings and also helped in checking if the conversation clusters identified in the social research comprehensively covered all the viewpoints.
4. The research team then sat down for a day long discussion to analyse the mood of each comment and decipher the key message. This was a qualitative phase and was great fun.
5. All comments were put into 11 Mood Buckets.
6. Various media reports and stories were also used to develop our own understanding.

01. Key Findings

Q1. Where is the maximum social chatter happening about Bigg Boss?

Facebook is the winner hands down. There are over 100 FB pages talking about Bigg Boss and its protagonists. It is estimated that 5.3 lac people are engaged on FB in talking about Ovia and BiggBoss.

• The maximum number of likes (1.38 lacs) is onwww.facebook.com/BigBossVijayTv/.
• The best engagement rate (156%) is onwww.facebook/biggbossparidhabangalThis site has a veritable collection of memes on Bigg Boss. An average of 89 posts is done daily on this page.
• Maximum shares and comments are on a pagewww.facebook.com/iamoviyaaverage of 10,111 shares per post from Oviya after her elimination from the show last week.
• This is distantly followed by Twitter. With 1852 likes and 35.3k followers on @BigBossNewz is the leading twitter handle.

02. Who is the hero of Bigg Boss ?

Ovia is the hero of Bigg Boss. More than 53% of engagement on Social Media channels has Ovia being the sole subject or the main subject. Ovia has created maximum number of stories on the news feed of people’s FB accounts. We estimate that appx. 5.3 lac people are engaged on FB in talking about Ovia. The mood of the conversations for Ovia is largely positive. Emotions like Love, Sympathy towards her and hate against Ovia’s competitors are largely seen. Many people believe she is the ideal woman – sister, lover, and wife. Both men and women love her equally. Her popularity has transcended from her reel life persona to real life adulation and craze for her. It will be appropriate to sum her popularity as “Bigg Boss = Ovia”.

Also No Ovia = No Bigg Boss. People are pretty sad and annoyed due to her elimination last weekend. Many of them have vowed not to watch Bigg Boss ever again. Oviaarmy and many other pages are trolling her opponents, Kamal Hasan and the Bigg Boss producers to bring her back as a wild card entry. It is expected that the viewership of Bigg Boss will come down in the coming days. There is an opportunity for Vijay TV to increase the viewership to an all-time high by scripting her re-entry. If the producers are reading this article, they will be running to grab this opportunity and create history.

There are comments rationalizing her exit. They talk about her mental ill-health and also Bigg Boos team being partial to her. This seems to be more of a placation rather than hate for her. A few negative comments about her being kiddish, throwing herself upon Arav and also her being a keralite are the main discussion points.

03. Who is the villain of Bigg Boss

Well there are 2 contenders. Gayathri is the front runner as villain. Hate for her is strong and cuts across all social chatter. She is very popular and is often seen as Ovia’s enemy no.1. She is grabbed almost 12 % of the chatter and the mood is largely negative. A few comments also hail her for being straight in your face attitude.

Sakthi is the 2nd contender as a villain. All the comments are negative about him.

04. Are there any other contenders

Unfortunately No. Rest of the participants are insignificant and inconsequential. The only comments about them are to vote for their eviction.

05. How do people see Arav

Arav doesn’t have a personality of his own. Or if he has one, people don’t identify with him. Onscreen romance with Ovia and breakup are the only highpoints of his social presence. He is largely a non-entity.

06. What do people think of Kamal Hasan

Well there are fans talking about a great job. But the numbers are fewer and get drowned in the Ovia mania. Then there are allegations about him favouring or being tough with certain contestants. Gauging by the social comments he is seen as popular but biased.

07. What do people think of Bigg Boss

Bigg Boss is seen as a paisa vasool entertainment program going by the comments used in our research. Viewers clearly know that it is a scripted show and all the drama in the Bigg Boss House is pre-scripted. It is noteworthy to mention that there are a few comments (statistically insignificant) about Bigg Boss ruining the tamil culture and the program should be stopped. Further deep dive into the comments and seeing them in the context of the happenings in the Bigg Boss house, we are of the opinion that they have been in reference to particular characters saying specifically controversial statements. There is no mood in the social scape that this program should be banned. On the contrary high levels of social engagements connote that people seem to be indulging themselves in the spicy drama being unfolded every week.

08. What can be the possible social impact of Bigg Boss on conservative Tamil culture? Is it lasting?

Bigg Boss is clearly an outlier on Tamil TV. It is brash, in your face and irreverent. It has shocked audiences like never before. The emotional strength of comments on the social media is a testimony to this. The program has jumped out of the TV screens and has become a favourite topic of social conversation. The trend is seen from metros like Chennai, Kochi and Hyderabad to even B and C class towns in Tamil Nadu and elsewhere. Its become a part of the social fabric for the time being. There are 2 trends emerging.

1. Social Generalizations – Based on certain happenings on the show, there have been lots of comments which generalize, criticize those behaviours in our society. Some of them are philosophical preaching while others are outright generalizations.
2. Abusive Outbursts – There has been an unusual increase in the abusive quotient on the comments. Some of them are character specific while others are about the program or the presenter per say. Comments are emotional, violent and abusive in varying doses.

Here are a few comments.

Tansi Ram Kamal sir its it very obvious that you too are obsessed with oviya…not surprised because she is young pretty and sexy. You are hurt with oviya’s exit. Please be fair to all ….you are bias! You are vengeful .. your eyes are showing are showing it all. No doubt you are also a nadigar tilagam but please be fair to all.

Caroline Manuel Everyone in this world doing sin… So many lies everyday so many people talking and also so many people talking bad words on others and so many people talks literally about others is everyday happening… So take it easy was a game show.. In Big boss everyone knows there camera is rolling… Like god also watching everyone in heaven.. So according to their sin god will punish them.. So don’t judge others and first think about yourself… Pls I love everyone in big boss… Julie she realise her fault like anything so stop talking about others.. All are human beings and pls forgive others… Gayathiri also realise her fault so don’t judge others

• Oviya is ok ! Ammma this is worst than Mahabharata saguni
• Its all karma…each and everyone of you will get back what u did to oviya.. All corner and torture her because they scared oviya will be the winner because she always got highest vote Now they will fight among them to win the title.good luck..
• Kamal is a coward didn’t ask important question to gay3….Kamal you too. . Gay3 is the root cause for all problems..very bad…we close watching BB from now.
• I can’t believe is this India Tamil Nadu culture ?? Irritating Julie actions and actings . Oh can’t believe is this how girls in Tamil Nadu??
• A fake person is someone who is not genuine and will do whatever it takes to make themselves look good. They will take credit for other’s work or down play the good of others to illuminate oneself.
• Fake people take part in hypocrisy, lies, and will turn on friendship the moment it no longer is a benefit for 5them. They will change their personality to fit into a certain group.
• Being so judgmental but have we clean our own laundry? Suddenly everyone behaves like never tell lies, never backstab before, never being rude neither being fake even once in their own life. Be practical and think for our own good sake. We should Learn lessons from the show not creating more problems in life. This my personal point of view, you may agree or disagree. Have a good day everyone.

True to Tamil cultural symbolism we idolise heroes and make them demi Gods. There should be Ovia Fan Club and Ovia kovil. The rest are to be hated intensely. All the comments portray characters and situations either in black or white. There is no scope for grey.

PTAT(People Talking About This) is an important Facebook metric. PTAT is a trailing seven-day Facebook metric that measures how many people are “talking” (creating stories) about your page. Stories are items that display in News Feed. Actions that create stories in News Feed include: Liking a page, posting on the page wall, engaging on a post, tagging or mentioning a page, page check-ins, and other page interactions. The PTAT metric has been valuable because it aggregates individual metrics to give you a big picture view of how many users are creating stories that display in others’ News Feed.

This research is published by BLeap Digital Research Team. For more information please visit bleap.in