But here's the gimmick: After each round, the players have to vote off the person they believe to be the weakest link -- think of "Survivor" with six tribal councils an episode. Yes, NBC has seen its Thursday lineup decimated by CBS's hit, and now it's payback time! And "Weakest Link" aims to be even more nasty and cutthroat than "Survivor" -- when only a few players are left, the not-so-smart links start ganging up on the smarter competition and voting them off, so a player is actually penalized in the end for knowing too much. (Actually, "Weakest Link" doesn't resemble "Survivor" or "Millionaire" as much as it recalls "Greed," Fox's crass, early "Millionaire" rip-off.)

Before each banishment, Robinson forces players to explain their votes, and the contestants say very nasty things about one another (again, coached, I bet). The voted-out player then has to take a "walk of shame" offstage through blinding white lights while the audience sits in silent judgment. Then, unlike the surprisingly gracious CBS castoffs in their postmortems, the "Weakest Link" losers whine to the camera about the players who voted them off. ("I'd like to see Eric go next. He's a vindictive little man.") "Weakest Link" makes "Survivor" look like a love-in.

NBC clearly intends "Weakest Link" to send a message to its competitors: Forget must-see TV; this is the new, reality-amped, smashmouth peacock! But the subtext is obvious: If you can't beat 'em, steal their biggest hits. NBC shot an alternate pilot of "Weakest Link" hosted by "Survivor" winner Richard Hatch (Hatch may end up hosting a daytime version of the show) and, last week, announced a special May sweeps celebrity edition of "Weakest Link" featuring stars of both "Survivor" series. That's just sad.

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All the "Survivor" stunts in the world can't hide the fact that "Weakest Link" is a deeply flawed show. One of the reasons for the success of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," for instance, is that it's a different show every night, because it revolves as much around the personality of the contestant in the hot seat as it does around Regis. You get to know the players on "Millionaire"; you get to care about them. But the players on "Weakest Link" are only fodder for Robinson's pointless cruelty and acrid negativity. We learn almost nothing about them. Every episode looks the same; every batch of contestants is interchangeable and colorless.

And, jeez, the show isn't even any good as a view-at-home ego booster! Usually, we watch quiz shows to feel all smart and superior and smug when we know the answers and the bozos on TV don't. But Robinson gets in the way of our fun, because no one is smarter or more superior or more smug than she. She's a distraction. She's a downer. She needs to take lessons from our homegrown quiz show pointyhead, Ben Stein, about how to be droll and sarcastic but still, you know, human.

Despite the certainty of public humiliation and the paltriness of the prize money (while the top prize is $500,000, no one yet has even cracked $100,000), "Weakest Link" will probably never suffer from a shortage of eager contestants -- some people will do anything to get their mugs on TV. Still, you have to wonder about the long-lasting appeal, on both sides of the tube, of a quiz show where players have a 7 in 8 chance of going away empty-handed. "Weakest Link" is a show about losing, not winning.

Surprisingly (well, I'm surprised), "Weakest Link" is a hit; the three episodes that aired last week improved upon each other in the Nielsens, with Wednesday's outing ranking as the most-watched program of the night. Maybe Americans crave a new Dr. Laura to slap them around. Or maybe the show's popularity reflects our deep-rooted inferiority complex when it comes to all things British -- you know, everything sounds smarter and classier in a British accent. Imagine if "Weakest Link" were not a BBC export but a Fox original hosted by, say, Howard Stern, who quoted verbatim Robinson's put-downs. The Op-Ed page screeds about reality show exploitation and the decline of civility would be piling up before the show even premiered.

It's time to get over this England worship, people! Dump the tea in the harbor, and toss Anne Robinson, too. You're in the Colonies now, for cryin' out loud. It's OK to be stupid!

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