Where am I, Toto? Is this the free-wheeling, wild frontier that was the Internet or some cigar bar on Park Avenue?

Just last month Salon Magazine makes a HUGE deal --- I mean, they ran the Internet equivalent of a full page ad --- to ballyhoo their new association with BarnesandNoble.com.

Now wait a minute... Let me get this straight. Isn't this the same Barnes and Noble that is featured on EVERY SINGLE PORTAL/SEARCH ENGINE on the 'Net? The same Barnes and Noble that has Affiliate relationships with more web sites than Custer had bullet holes? The same Barnes and Noble with which even the hip and happenin' little G21 has had a relationship with for almost a year?

Well, Kids, like I was saying The Big Deal is The Big Deal. Everybody who is anybody on the World Wide Web these days is involved in A Deal. It's the big shakeout that all the 'Net pundits predicted would take place a year ago. They were a year early. The shakeout is happening now and it has everybody scrambling for cover.... or A Deal.

In fact, believe it or not, the buzz in our private conference here at The World's Magazine for the last week and a half has not been about Northern Ireland, Bill Clinton's impeachment, the situation in the Middle East, or the problems of the Russian or Asian economies.

Nope.

We have been going around, ad nauseum, about a five page Licensing Agreement with the new Alta Vista Entertainment Zone. Yes, that Alta Vista; the venerable Internet search engine is going the portal route. Like every other search engine. The AOL-Netscape deal only clinched this phenomenon we are calling aggregation, or convergence, depending on which Internet pundit you talk to next. They sent us a little missive asking if we would be interested in becoming a "content-provider" (another popular buzzword these days) for their Comedy channel.


And so the Deal Talk got started. We said, "Make an offer." And they sent us their pitch and five pages of legalese.

BUT THERE'S MORE.

Like every good convergence convert, what Alta Vista wants is not just being an Internet phenom, but also having this Deal involve CBS/Eyemark. Yes, that CBS; the venerable old broadcast television network is going the new media route. Like every other broadcast television network. The pitch for this Deal is also the cross-promotional, co-branding opportunities provided by getwild! the show, on CBS.

Now when you look at The Show, you'll note that it features the typical twenty-something guy and gal with names like Tad and Buffy, burbling on about the next cool thing you can find on the Internet. Except, this is CBS we're talking about here, as in Dan Rather-Dead Last in The Ratings-Old Fogey Central CBS.

So Tad and Buffy, though being "available in 88% of the domestic television market.." as CBS/Eyemark's hype assures us, are on-air during TV deadtime. Here in Manhattan, you can catch them on the local CBS station at 3:00 a.m. In Dallas, it's 3:00 a.m. on Saturday.

From what I could tell, in most of the markets that feature this piece of fluff, it airs opposite Jerry Springer or Oprah. CBS. Never-See TV. (Yes, I'm a proud graduate of the David Letterman School of Corporation Relations.)

"But wait!" you say. "Rod, this is A Big Internet Deal.

"G21 would go from being 'that cool station at the end of the FM dial' (Thanks, and a tip of the hat to our own JEFF WINBUSH) to being part of a Major Internet Entertainment Channel. You can't afford NOT to seize this opportunity!"

THE ART OF THE DEAL: "Stretch Out On the Force, Luke" - I haven't said much about our application to WebLab here. Frankly, that's because I didn't want to jinx the deal. And, frankly, I don't even know if the Alta Vista deal impacts on our application or not. But it's the opposition between the light and dark sides of The Force, again.

WebLabs is very much our idea of the Jedi brotherhood. We get to focus on the innovative, community-building side of the Web. Our writers get the support they need to experiment with new technologies, scripts, and the exposure that PBS and the Ford Foundation can offer.

That is the direction we were going before the Big Internet Deal frenzy started. Now, we have to ask ourselves are we at a crossroads, facing a Faustian bargain.

Here, at the end of the day, the decision is all mine....

I wish I could tell you I have the wisdom to know what to do next. Stay tuned.

ABOUT BIG ATTITUDE: As one of the writers here noted, part of the reason The Suits approached us is because much of what the AV Entertainment Zone considers funny is not. So they need "creatives" like us who have proven we understand and deliver comedy. They might be good at structuring strategic alliances (emphasis on might), but they don't know from comedy.

A classic example is all the Marketing types who keep asking what it is we offer here at The World's Magazine. What is our product? Our product is ATTITUDE. Big Attitude. Somebody has to have it, after all, and we have honed Big Attitude to a science.

We're glad you're here. We have a lot to offer this (and EVERY) week. Stick around. More importantly: TELL EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS. We want you here EVERY DAY.

WHY?

Because we like you...