Loss

I mentioned this in a post before, but I think Bo should basically look like Tom Cruise in Magnolia, even wearing a headset mic.

I think it's good in most cases, but in some cases like Bo Dallas, it doesn't fit the gimmick and makes them look less like stars.

Probably because Vince decided "retiring" sounded like something old people who are moving to Florida do, not World Wrestling Federation Superstars.

The lapsed fan thing has always seemed weird to me, because WWE bragging about how many lapsed fans as potential buyers is strange, as if they weren't driven away, they just happen to be lapsed. Most people who did watch and don't anymore watched just like a TV show where they thought about it when it was on and stopped thinking about it when it was off. I wouldn't pay a monthly fee to access television shows I watched years ago anytime I wanted. I can't see someone who stopped watching wrestling caring enough to pay to watch it anytime they want now. YouTube is going to satisfy those type of former fans just fine.

I don't think price is the issue. I think bad promotion is the big issue, followed by content. If anything, I think WWE is hyping the value aspect of it way too much. Michael Cole has no credibility with the audience and is not the guy who should be singing the praises of the Network. The people who should are Hogan, Austin, Undertaker, Michaels, Flair, Rock, Bret ... those types.

I like the idea of having tiered subscriptions. A premium sub would also get you special deals on live event tickets and merchandise, along with some exclusive, more rare content that wouldn't be made available for regular subscribers. I'm thinking territories here.

I understand why the post struck a nerve. There's not really anything in your reply that I would call a bad response or anything I disagree with, actually. I freely admit that what I said was more of an instinctive response than a rational one. I want the Network to succeed because I like paying less money for more wrestling, but it seems like a significant number of fans are finding ways to buck the system. Normally, that wouldn't irk me at all, but when it creates a narrative that the launch of the Network is a bad thing, that annoys me because the launch of the Network is a great thing. And I don't want the system buckers to ruin this for everyone.

I was thinking more of a scenario where they sold the debt to a collection agency that would then pursue people for the money. The number of cancellations was significant enough that there's a lot of lost money there. Yes, it would be bad PR, but they are also well within their rights to do it. I think about other subscription/commitment-model businesses and can't think of any that don't collect when people bail early. Gyms do it all the time.

There's the saying that the customer is always right, but I hate the modern sense of entitlement, generally speaking. And I hate to do finger-pointing, but I feel like anyone who loves wrestling and is sharing a password is also doing something to actively destroy wrestling. Yeah, do that, and if everyone acts just like you, eventually there won't be a WWE Network. You are part of the problem, because you're helping send a message to WWE that the network is a bad idea when it's actually a great idea. There are problems with the execution of it for sure, but giving WWE any reason to think this was a wasted endeavor and they should go back to their old model is really bad. EDIT: And I realize there are definitely hypocritical points I'm making, for reasons we don't need to get into in this topic. But damnit, that's my take on this, rational or not.

Also, they should send collection agencies after people who cancelled. They violated the TOS by canceling early. They should go get their money.

For people in my age bracket, it really is similar to having unlimited access to a video store that happens to have every pay-per-view ever. But a generation has grown up with video stores becoming a dying medium, so that would be an awful selling point.

I thought it was interesting at Survivor Series '96 when Jim Ross was pointing out that Austin/Bret would probably not contain a lot of high risk moves. When he said, "I think you're likely to see it all", it came off like he was defending the match when all Ross was doing was describing the style he anticipated for the match.

Isn't it awfully presumptuous of us to pass moral judgment on people we don't personally know? How about we reflect and ask ourselves what makes us so desperate to tear other people down? Heels are people too, you know.

Mike Johnson of PWInsider - common abbreviation of his name.

What I didn't understand about Summerslam '98 being hyped so much is that anyone who subscribes can watch that show anytime. I think it would have been cooler for them to do an extended video package highlighting all Summerslams with some tagline at the end that you can watch them all whenever you want.

I think what it comes down to is that Dave bases his match opinions almost entirely on hot crowds unless they involve either guys he doesn't care for or there are major execution problems where he doesn't think they deserved that reaction. For the most part, I think he's consistent on that and as much as we bag him around here, I probably agree with him on matches just as often as I disagree with him. I'm not the type to forever write off someone's match reviewing because they had one review (or even a few) where I didn't see what they saw at all. I've probably felt that way about something everyone on this board has written at some point, and I'm sure the same applies to me. I don't think Dave has always seen wrestling this way as far as the importance of the crowd, and I think he'd probably give Hogan matches much higher ratings if they were happening now. He wouldn't go back and watch them now because he doesn't believe in that, but his outlook on these things I do think has changed over time.

I don't expect that will ever happen. I can see Undertaker agreeing to do it without having ever listened to the show and not realizing what he was in for. But there's no way Undertaker would go on there and break character.

Hogan actually wanted to take him on in a shoot, which is hilarious looking back.

I'm definitely renewing. Short-term, I think they're really going to struggle, but long-term, I think they'll get their stuff together, if only because they have to get their stuff together since their entire future depends on it. To me, subscribing to the Network was always more about being part of something that I think is going to be a game changer (for the better eventually) and has tons of potential to be really cool than it ever was that I wanted to see them put up specific libraries. They are just going through growing pains right now, but I don't think the future of the Network is dire by any means. My concern is that if too many people start bowing out, WWE will take the wrong message from that. The Network *is* the way to go in the future and I hope they never backtrack on it. The problem is the way they're doing it, not that they're doing it at all.

I thought they were talking about Cena/Cesaro compared to the G-1 Climax.

Anyway, I was about to say in the Current WWE thread that his talk about Cena-Cesaro not being a match that would look good years from now was interesting, because it contradicts his usual opinion on these things. He did ultimately say that any match that works for the people in the building is good period, but he did openly ask if that means we should call all of those old Ultimate Warrior matches that were bad yet managed to get over really good just because they worked in the building. Is it possible he's coming around?

In fairness, he wasn't comparing NJPW to WWE, he was comparing New Japan's biggest match season of the year to an episode of Raw that we'll likely forget soon. Dave wasn't the one who was setting out to make that point. Bryan was the one who brought it up and Dave just responded to him. What I thought was more interesting was ... something that I'll post in the Dave Meltzer stuff thread.

I liked the match, but it also told me that it's a good thing we haven't seen these two feud. Outside of strength spots, there's not really much they can do to make the matches distinct from each other. Cesaro was fine in that match, but he is also a guy that hasn't improved his ability as a heel in the past six months. I'm starting to think the upper midcard is the right place for him. Please don't read that to mean he shouldn't be protected, as I feel like in theory, that's a good spot on the card that shouldn't make for a bad career. It's more that his matches tend to be all about the spots and impressive feats of strength more than generating any type of emotion.

They definitely should have pre-made "best of" playlists available the same way iTunes does for both big names and popular genres.

Actually, to be fair, I always thought they were really good at naming some of their pay-per-views. Bound For Glory, Victory Road and Slammiversary are pretty strong PPV names. That's all I got though.