BAY STREET • Industry insiders and ego-arbitragers were expecting excitement and cutthroat competition from the CEO castaways on Survivor - Canadian Media Mogul Edition, but no one expected the blood to flow so freely and quickly. With the world-class nastiness and dynamic double-dealing on display, convergence could become a medal sport for the next olympics.

In this uniquely Canadian version of the show, nine ruthless castaway CEOs, who hail from a cross-section of Canadian media conglomerates were stranded on an isolated tropical island to fend for themselves in a dog-eat-dog battle for supremacy. At the end of the series, the lone Ultimate Survivor will be crowned King of Korporate Konvergence. Their prize will be the virtually unlimited power, profit and political influence of a 100% complete Canadian media monopoly.

Ted and Pierre - Battle of the titanic egos

The main event anticipated last week was the duel to the death between Ted (Rogers) of the Broadcast Tribe and Pierre (Paladeau) of the Print Tribe over who would be the successful suitor for Videotron, the largest Cable and broadcast Network in Quebec.

Ted had got off on the right foot by announcing a marriage made in heaven with Claude (Chagnon) the Videotron supremo. But their delirious honeymoon coitus was rudely interuptus when Precocious Pierre whipped out his whopping great pole of cash and attempted to lure Claude from the matrimonial media bed.

Ted's hot tears of cuckolded shame at being outmatched by Pierre's fiscal apparatus were followed by bitter recriminations and counter-recriminations.

As in all marital dust-ups, the soiled sheets were soon crawling with lawyers armed with three-piece suits and counter-suits. The legal lechery commenced as they defiled claims and counter-claims for making a mockery of merger vows, mental and financial anguish, counseling cable adultery, flagrant financial fornicatrix, wanton convergence concubinage, pimping of public pensions, and regulatory rape.

When all the injunctory dust had settled, the crocodile tears were shed, and the business blood-letting had abated, Pierre's prodigious financial prowess prevailed. Claude swooned (to the tune of $5.4 billion smackers) into the arms of his Quebe-hard-cor studmuffin. Ted was left to lick his wounds and slink off with his tail between his legs and a $240 million divorce fee in his hands.

To prove he was still a player and on the game, Ted peremtorally purchased Cable Atlantic (the biggest cable network in Newfoundland!) for $232 million and the Toronto Blue Jays baseball team for $122 million. Thus ensuring that next time he takes his bat and goes home, nobody else in Canada will be able to play. As an afterthought, Ted insisted that he WILL buy SportsNet from CTV even though Izzy is still challenging him for that deal.

Jean and Ken - Almost no sale

The curtains were hardly closed on this satyrical soap opera when an even bigger convergence bombshell was dropped. Ken "I'll Never Sell the Globe and Mail" Thomson's newspaper, The Globe and Mail, claimed on its front page that Ken was selling - wait for it - The Globe and Mail to BCE's Jean "Let's Make a Deal" Monty.

When the deal was officially announced later in the week, Ken maintained that he wasn't "selling" his beloved Globe, he was just "merging" it. The transaction gives Ken almost half as much control of the Globe as the mergee, Jean's BCE. And though Ken may only be a cut-rate 30% media magnate now, you have to give him credit for billion-dollar bluff and bravado.

Jean acknowledged that the deal didn't give him the biggest convergence construction set, but he claimed it is the best - with all the #1 toys. Jean also told a cautionary tale about his little merger that almost wasn't. Apparently, Jean and his lawyers almost walked away from the table when some Globe minions not only sniffed out the deal, but insisted on pissing it all over the front page of the (soon to be his) paper.

The story ran, the deal was done and all the corporate executives will live happily ever after. Jean promised to ensure the lapdog integrity of the Globe's newsroom just as he done with CTV's - which coincidentally didn't breathe a word of the impending merger.

Blood in the water

Meanwhile the other ruthless castaway CEOs weren't just biding their time or padding their resumes, they were prowling the stormy TSE seas for food. Like great white sharks, media mogul survivors must devour or die.

Alliance-Atlantis, Astral Media, Cogeco cable, CHUM and every other pre-converged media company in Canada looked like lunch as the ravenous conglomerate carnivores circled and toyed with their helpless prey.

Although none of the bigger fish were swallowed, JR's Corus subsidiary (aka Shaw Media) managed to snap one of the stragglers - Nelvana - for the bitesize price of $540 million. Of course, some nay-sayers may discount Shaw for hastily spinning-off their media holdings just before the convergence-fever epidemic swept this country.

Korporate Konvergence Kouncil

The highlight of every Survivor episode is the Korporate Konvergence Kouncil when a crack jury of IPO analysts, leveraged buyout specialists and merchant bankers decide which CEO has failed in his duty as a corporate predator and must leave the island. The jury took the decisive step of banishing both Claude and Ken for being on the bottom of their respective steamy merger sessions.

Despite losing the epic battle of Quebecor, tired Ted managed to survive by the skin of his dentures. No one doubts that he must bag a major media trophy soon or that big one that got away will come back to haunt him. JR and Arthur also have to get their takeover acts together and take them on the road if they don't want to wake up next week as convergence roadkill.

All patriotic Canadians should tune into the next episode of our country's unique Survivor programme. In no other western democracy could you assemble such a stellar cast of only nine, now six, billionaires who control 90% of the country's daily newspapers, television networks, cable systems, and high-speed internet access, as well as a huge chunk of its radio waves and most of its major world-wide-web portals. And only in Canada is it legal for the lone survivor to own it all.

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