LAS VEGAS ? In the simple days before ?convergence? had something to do with media, print journalists generally dismissed broadcast people as vain, blow-dried morons who earned too much and knew too little.

Teevee folks didn?t care. They had money and some measure of fame, unlike the sullen and physically grotesque newspaper creatures.

Who knows if such stereotypes persist? The cable talk shows are full of print reporters ? still sullen, still ugly ? and national broadcasters file reports to text-heavy Web sites and newspapers are as flat and fake as the 5 o?clock news. Convergence happened sometime in the mid 1990s.

But I still feel nervous walking around these overdressed teevee people, even their tech crews assembling giant displays of HDTV screens and pyramids of empty cellophaned boxes for products still in development. After a few hours of walking around the half-open exhibits at the Las Vegas Convention Center, I got on the shuttle and headed to the Sands Expo ? where the New Media conferences and e-whatever halls are exiled. Convergence or not, the e-stuff is still in the ghetto.

It?s less frantic over here, and the pressroom lacks beverages and sandwiches. A year ago, this pressroom would?ve been filled with youngsters from all those glossy tech magazines and unreadable cybernews sites. Maybe Inside.com would?ve installed a martini bar.

Gloom and Consciousness

Today?s panels at the New Media Super Session were gloomy ? surviving without traditional VC funding, repurposing failed news sites as entertainment companies, trying to collect the little revenue earned by New Media ventures, etc. U.S. Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) gave the opening speech, but I was at the wrong convention center, arguing with an HDTV sales rep.

Which was fine, because the only compelling panel I witnessed today was the alternative-funding chat. Michael Keegan of Bold New World, an LA-based tech-marketing firm, got some laughs from the sparse crowd by comparing Web survivors to America?s favorite water-cooler subject.

?Right now, the Internet is like the Survivor TV show,? he said. ?If you?re still on the island in a few months, the rewards are tremendous.'?

Of course, few are left on the island today.

The next guy to catch my ear, on the same panel, was a Laguna Beach tech investor. Steven S. Sadleir runs the Conscious Media Fund, LLC. While ?conscious? and ?media? are rarely spoken in the same sentence, Sadleir gave a sincere if new-agey talk about improving the world?s media landscape by investing in decent projects made by talented creators ? and still making the bucks.

?It?s a lot more visionary than the old rigid systems? of venture capital, Sadleir said. ?Virtually all of our investments have been financially fruitful, although that?s not the reason we?re doing it.?

But at a convention full of amoral television people, Sadleir might want to reconsider the text of his fund?s brochure: How many times have you thought to yourself after watching a television program, Internet game or movie, ?What a waste of time??

By the end of the panel, Sadleir sounded less New Age when he shot down about 97 percent of the New Media business plans floating around here: ?If you can?t make revenue within a year, personally I wouldn?t even look at the project. Our investors are too impatient.?

And so was I. Hoping to find out more about this Conscious Media Fund, I hovered around after the talk. But earnest little sharks got there first, and after 10 minutes I left for a cigarette. Maybe I?ll track him down later in the week.