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GERMAN LESSONS
by Daren Foster

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DAREN FOSTER PODCAST September 1 2009 - PRESS PLAY TO LISTEN

GERMAN LESSONS
by Daren Foster

***Canwest Global's standing 8 count.***

As a language, I am not a big fan of German. It lacks the easy grace and fluid fun of les tongues du Romance. Rather than flowing forth with an insouciant bounce in its step, German is spewed out as if the speaker detests the words he’s having to sprechen; hurled violently by the epiglottis as far away from the speaker as possible in order to immediately disavow anything that was just said. The tone is didactic. I feel brow-beaten when I hear it. German unsettles me. Maybe it was all the World War II movies from my youth.

Still, one can hate a language while loving certain words or phrases that are part of it. Gestalt. Baden-Baden. Auf Wiedersehen.

Schadenfreude.

Schadenfreude.

Not only sinisterly satisfying, schadenfreude is one of those words that sound exactly like it means. Profoundly onomatopoetic.

Schadenfreude: (shäd'n-froi'də) n. Pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others. [German : Schaden, damage (from Middle High German schade, from Old High German scado) + Freude, joy (from Middle High German vreude, from Old High German frewida, from frō, happy).]

Who amongst us has not derived at least some momentary pleasure by bearing witness to the downfall or even slight stumble of those we deem to have had it coming? Let’s face it, it’s much easier to feel better about ourselves by laughing at the trials and tribulations of others than it is to actually grab the bull by the horns and actively change our own lives for the better. Is not a snide snicker far more satisfying to our well being than say a Pilates class, as the former comes so effortlessly to us?

Accepting this unfortunate but highly enjoyable aspect of human nature, I was mildly annoyed to learn that in my absence a couple of weeks ago Canadian media giant Canwest Global staggered into bankruptcy protection. They couldn’t wait until my return? Would it have hurt them to hold off on that decision for a couple of days so I could be front and centre to start the crowing? What’s a few hundred thousand in interest when you’re already nearly four billion dollars in debt? It’s almost as if they delayed the inevitable until I was out of the country in order to try and slip the news in under the radar.

Nice try, Canwest Global. You may be able to slink under the umbrella of bankruptcy protection in order to avoid the grasp of your creditors but that’s not going to save you from the joyfully wrathful anvils of my schadenfreude. I’ve been waiting too long to dance a jig on your grave to let this happy, happy development pass unnoticed.

Admittedly, it is not yet the total flame-out I’ve long dreamt about, or that a company like Canwest Global deserves. Nothing short of absolute penury and utter destitution for the entire Asper family would ring the bell atop my satisfaction meter. Their corporate offices and family homes should be set upon by angry, torch-bearing mobs. All their television stations should be forced to broadcast only test patterns. Runs of the National Post should be shipped straight off to fish and chips shops to wrap takeout orders and to pet stores to line bird cages. Thoughts of digging up Izzy Asper’s corpse and hanging it outside the company’s headquarters in Winnipeg as an admonishment of corporate perfidy are ultimately rejected as being slightly excessive.

Alas, such happy endings seldom befall such deserving offenders. Usually they walk away from the wreckage relatively unscathed; their family fortunes diminished but never wiped out. That’s the fate for the underlings who inevitably find themselves jobless and pension-less. Vacation pay? What vacation pay?

Still, I endeavour to embrace the positive in all this. There have been and will continue to be explanations galore about how such a thing could’ve happened to Canada’s Biggest Media Company™. It over-extended itself, especially by buying scumbag-in-arms Conrad Black’s chain of floundering newspapers in 2000 and loading the company with a mountain of unmanageable debt. Ingrate children lacked their father’s (and company founder’s) “vision” and pissed away everything he had built. Last year’s economic meltdown hit the company hard, right where it lives: advertising revenue.

All true to a degree perhaps but ultimately missing the one vital factor: at its core, Canwest Global’s most glaring weakness, which made it so vulnerable to the vagaries of economic shifting sands, was its lack of a distinctive, identifiable brand. As the media universe expanded wildly over the last couple decades, the company took a huge gamble to ensure it survived and flourished by becoming big, ginormous even, swallowing up as many outlets and platforms as it could get its hands on. It was right in the middle of the synergy craze that swept the business nation, ready to thrive when whatever was going to happen happened.

The miscalculation came from failing to realize that in a world of entertainment consisting of a 1001 options, you need a better reason to draw eyes in your direction than by simply just being there. Consumers have to be made aware of your presence in what is a seemingly bottomless vat of options. You need to fill a niche. You need to be unique. You need to be a recognizable brand, engaging the public in a one of a kind manner they can’t find anywhere else.

However, Canwest Global’s brand is nothing more than the making of money. From the very beginning, when Izzy Asper bought an American TV station, brought it north of the border and began broadcasting, his whole raison d’être (I don’t know how to say that in German) was money. Money, money, money. There was no “vision”. No brand idea for a different kind of television that audiences wouldn’t find anywhere else. Just the first step in building a media empire, using government regulations when they were favourable and trying to slip around them when they weren’t.

When Canwest began buying up newspapers in 2000 (despite all indicators pointing to this being a very unwise investment), it had nothing to do with a sweeping vision and everything to do with pushing its own agenda to tower ever higher over the Canadian media landscape. The newspaper arm of the conglomerate giant was ruthlessly utilized as a megaphone for uniform opinions that benefited big business in general and the Asper family in particular. Less government regulation! More tax cuts! Gut the CBC! While the strategy bore some fruit, its effectiveness was significantly undercut by the fact that fewer and fewer people were reading newspapers.

Not surprisingly, one of the few Canwest Global assets that seems to have any value right now and remain outside of the bankruptcy protection arena are the digital channels that came along with the purchase of Alliance-Atlantis in 2007. Somebody else’s vision, bought by Canwest with the help of the American investment bank, Goldman Sachs, complete with a serious skirting of Canadian media ownership rules in the process. A perfect trifecta!

Perfect except for the whole running out of money and being in hock up to the eyeballs business. In a just world, Canwest’s move into bankruptcy protection would be merely the opening act for the whole enterprise being picked clean and sold off for parts. Somehow I don’t think it’s going to be that satisfying from a schadenfreude perspective. But maybe, just maybe, in its diminished capacity to clog up the media arteries, the public won’t really notice Canwest Global’s increased absence. I mean as recent events have shown, no one really noticed its presence either. That’s what happens when you build a dream without a vision. And it couldn’t happen to better people.