WWE Network finally happening

[Loss]

Here's a question. If they put all of their pay-per-views on the channel, how would we know who is drawing on top and who isn't? What would be the new metric? Just television ratings. I know it's geeky, but I'm thinking of this in terms of future HOF debates.

[goc]

One possible good thing coming from the idea of doing PPVs on the Network is it would seemingly make them go back to strictly 12 PPVs a year. I would assume they wouldn't want to schedule a month where you could get 2 PPVs for the cost of 1 monthly subscription.

[WingedEagle]

Here's a question. If they put all of their pay-per-views on the channel, how would we know who is drawing on top and who isn't? What would be the new metric? Just television ratings. I know it's geeky, but I'm thinking of this in terms of future HOF debates.

Initially I thought you could look at how subscriptions jump in a given month or period, but if we're assuming once someone scubscribes they stay for a while that will have its flaws as well once its base is (hopefully) established.

[Loss]

It just seems like it would lead more and more to WWE giving us their moral view of what they want to be instead of what their fans want to see, with no impetus to do otherwise. If business is the same regardless of who is on top, the history of the company tells us who they'll put on top. Moments where everything clicks are fleeting as it is, and I hope this wouldn't be an unintended negative consequence. Wrestling has been going in that direction for a while now -- booking for an audience of one -- but hopefully, this doesn't complete the transition once and for all.

[Bix]

One possible good thing coming from the idea of doing PPVs on the Network is it would seemingly make them go back to strictly 12 PPVs a year. I would assume they wouldn't want to schedule a month where you could get 2 PPVs for the cost of 1 monthly subscription.

They already went back to 12 PPVs a year. The problems come from the 6 week gap in between Elimination Chamber and WrestleMania being made up for later in the year. Thankfully there are no 2 week gaps next year.

[Marty]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I'm in Canada, so I have my doubts it would be available right away. I would take the same approach Loss would though.

[goc]

It just seems like it would lead more and more to WWE giving us their moral view of what they want to be instead of what their fans want to see, with no impetus to do otherwise. If business is the same regardless of who is on top, the history of the company tells us who they'll put on top. Moments where everything clicks are fleeting as it is, and I hope this wouldn't be an unintended negative consequence. Wrestling has been going in that direction for a while now -- booking for an audience of one -- but hopefully, this doesn't complete the transition once and for all.

It kind of feels like that's almost been done already though. Especially if you believe the reports that they are blaming weak buyrates in the last 3 PPVs on Daniel Bryan and not Randy Orton. Bryan hasn't had nearly as much of a chance to prove himself as a draw as Randy. Randy however has shown he ISN'T a draw, especially when they tried to move him to Smackdown and make him the "ace" and house show ticket sales dropped off big time.

[Matt D]

It just seems like it would lead more and more to WWE giving us their moral view of what they want to be instead of what their fans want to see, with no impetus to do otherwise. If business is the same regardless of who is on top, the history of the company tells us who they'll put on top. Moments where everything clicks are fleeting as it is, and I hope this wouldn't be an unintended negative consequence. Wrestling has been going in that direction for a while now -- booking for an audience of one -- but hopefully, this doesn't complete the transition once and for all.

It kind of feels like that's almost been done already though. Especially if you believe the reports that they are blaming weak buyrates in the last 3 PPVs on Daniel Bryan and not Randy Orton. Bryan hasn't had nearly as much of a chance to prove himself as a draw as Randy. Randy however has shown he ISN'T a draw, especially when they tried to move him to Smackdown and make him the "ace" and house show ticket sales dropped off big time.

 

Obviously that was Christian's fault.

[Bix]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I'm in Canada, so I have my doubts it would be available right away. I would take the same approach Loss would though.

 

Before you even get to how receptive the cable/satellite companies would be, how involved/difficult/time consuming is the process for CRTC approval?

[Marty]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I'm in Canada, so I have my doubts it would be available right away. I would take the same approach Loss would though.

 

Before you even get to how receptive the cable/satellite companies would be, how involved/difficult/time consuming is the process for CRTC approval?

 

That's a rhetorical question, I'm assuming?

[Death From Above]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I'm in Canada, so I have my doubts it would be available right away. I would take the same approach Loss would though.

 

I've only skimmed this thread at most, are they actually going to even do it here? Seems like Sportsnet 360 is pushing themselves as the one-stop source for WWE in this country right now, and they'd have an absolutely massive fucking gap in their programming if it all goes to a WWE Network. It would be almost as bad as Gol TV post losing La Liga. :-)

 

I'd point out that Sportsnet also broadcasts the NFL Thursday Night game, despite NFL Network being available here as well as a specialty channel. There's a chance Raw at the very least could remain a Sportsnet property and they might not lose it all.

[Dylan Waco]

Here's a question. If they put all of their pay-per-views on the channel, how would we know who is drawing on top and who isn't? What would be the new metric? Just television ratings. I know it's geeky, but I'm thinking of this in terms of future HOF debates.

Merchandising, which I would argue is already as good a metric as anything.

[Loss]

We sadly don't have access to those numbers ... do we?

[flyonthewall2983]

So now they're talking of putting all their PPV's on? I thought it was just the ones that weren't the big four?

[BlueGuy]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I'm in Canada, so I have my doubts it would be available right away. I would take the same approach Loss would though.

 

I've only skimmed this thread at most, are they actually going to even do it here? Seems like Sportsnet 360 is pushing themselves as the one-stop source for WWE in this country right now, and they'd have an absolutely massive fucking gap in their programming if it all goes to a WWE Network. It would be almost as bad as Gol TV post losing La Liga. :-)

 

I'd point out that Sportsnet also broadcasts the NFL Thursday Night game, despite NFL Network being available here as well as a specialty channel. There's a chance Raw at the very least could remain a Sportsnet property and they might not lose it all.

 

Chances are Sportsnet would keep all of their current WWE programming at least until the end of their current deal, much like Syfy and USA network. At most, the few shows that would get duplicated on WWE Network (like Vintage and NXT) could be blacked out or, assuming they air it at the same time, overlapped with the Sportsnet feed.

 

For what it's worth, I'd be shocked to see new Raw and Smackdown airing on the WWE Network. USA Network and Syfy would get the first airings, while Universal HD would get the second airing (currently on the weekend). Raw would have to be at least seven days old before being shown on WWE Network. At that point, there's probably no reason to air it as it'll only confuse people attempting to keep up with the current storylines.

[Kevin Ridge]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

I ran with the old WWE 24/7 for a while and usually enjoyed what was provided. Part of the problem would be when I'd be too busy at certain points to be able to watch everything provided before it expired from viewing window. As far as Network I'd really have to consider price and schedule. Already, I'm paying way too much for cable since I barely watch it outside of Soccer/Hockey and movies on TCM. I think as we move on we really are going to go to the Pay as You Go model for cable as more and more people drop it for internet viewing. Stuff like cable/newspapers are totally surviving on older people. There are just so many channels available that people don't watch. I'm tired of sports contracts like NFL/College sports inflating the cost of my cable bill. You talk about a bubble that is going to burst huge down the road and it's the NFL. Similar to WWE in a way where you have less young kids getting into the sport (legit athletes moving to UFC) which leads to a drop off in quality athletes ending up in the game and therefore the quality of the product suffering a big drop off as time goes. The NFL is going to be a much different sport in the next 10-20 years. Really, this sport has their short (every game counts) schedule and the demand for betting that really props it up. But the powers to be there now wants to make the NFL a year long thing by stretching out the combine and draft and adding additional games to the regular season and playoffs. Talk about over saturating the product. You have games Thursday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday now. Even the most loyal NFL fans are being overwhelmed. You are lucky to have one really good game a week to watch. If I'm running any type of sports league right now I trying to get a long term contract from the cable networks cause over time the paying customer won't be going for this on their TV.

[cm funk]

For what it's worth, I'd be shocked to see new Raw and Smackdown airing on the WWE Network. USA Network and Syfy would get the first airings, while Universal HD would get the second airing (currently on the weekend). Raw would have to be at least seven days old before being shown on WWE Network. At that point, there's probably no reason to air it as it'll only confuse people attempting to keep up with the current storylines.

No way RAW and/or SD would air in full on the network, but if they're smart they'd incorporate them into the programming. Pre-game show, post-game show, a "this week in the WWE" type highlight show etc.

 

I don't know what they have planned, but there's some awesome possibilities. Not just for entertainment value, but to maximize the potential of the whole deal

[JonnyBart]

I'd think pre-game and post-game shows for Raws and PPVs are a given.

[bradhindsight]

I'm curious; just among people on this board, how many would subscribe to a WWE Channel? This is obviously as intense a group of wrestling fans as you'll find, but there are also a lot of folks inclined to seek the footage through other avenues.

Personally, I'd be more inclined to subscribe to it if it was an a la carte digital service. Cable TV is a dinosaur. Everything is on demand now. The cable companies are fighting tooth and nail against a la carte for obvious reasons, but still, they see the future, and are slowly relenting to it.

 

I'm not a big tv watcher or cable tv guy anyway, I don't want 500 channels to deal with to find what I want to see. I'd pay to watch a WWE channel, but I wouldn't pay the 10-15 dollar fee ON TOP of whatever the cable provider charges

 

I subscribe to HBO and can go on-demand and watch any of their movies or series whenever. I'd imagine the WWE could do the same.

[David]

According to Court Bauer (http://mlwradio.libsyn.com/bauer-pollock-25), there still isn't interest in the WWE Network from cable and satellite providers because they don't want to lose their share of the revenue from PPV buys and replace it with a possibly smaller share from network subscriptions. However, he did note that Netflix and Hulu have expressed some interest.

 

While he noted that it's a fluid situation and the interested parties could quickly change, and he wasn't sure how it would work (considering both services are essentially video-on-demand), Court felt this could be an opportunity to work with a company with resources (Netflix in particular), and it would reduce WWE's risk in the network.

 

At this point, it seems like there's at least a decent chance that we could get an "over-the-top" network, considering the target launch date is a little less than three months away and there's still no indication that a single provider will decide to carry it. Still, there a lot of questions as to how this would work.

[jdw]

30M Netflix subs in the US, 40M worldwide. It's growing fast, about 5M new in the US in the past year. It's quite a bit below cable penetration.

 

I'm still interested in how much money content providers are making off Netflix in the model the WWE would be following.

[Bix]

30M Netflix subs in the US, 40M worldwide. It's growing fast, about 5M new in the US in the past year. It's quite a bit below cable penetration.

 

I'm still interested in how much money content providers are making off Netflix in the model the WWE would be following.

They do have more subscribers in the US than HBO does, though.

 

If they do go with an internet based service, being some pioneering paid tier of an established service is probably their best bet, or negotiating big rights fees as part of the existing services. They'd have no software development costs or anything like that and they'd already be accessible on most streaming devices. Netflix especially is on basically every connected device now and has by far the best software/interface. The big question mark is if they'd keep the plans for including the PPVs.

[jdw]

30M Netflix subs in the US, 40M worldwide. It's growing fast, about 5M new in the US in the past year. It's quite a bit below cable penetration.

 

I'm still interested in how much money content providers are making off Netflix in the model the WWE would be following.

They do have more subscribers in the US than HBO does, though.

Sure. But HBO is a channel, while Netflix is closer to a Carrier than a channel. The WWE Network on Netflix would be the equiv of HBO on Netflix's Comcast/DirecTV/TWC.

 

 

If they do go with an internet based service, being some pioneering paid tier of an established service is probably their best bet, or negotiating big rights fees as part of the existing services. They'd have no software development costs or anything like that and they'd already be accessible on most streaming devices. Netflix especially is on basically every connected device now and has by far the best software/interface. The big question mark is if they'd keep the plans for including the PPVs.

If they go internet, Netflix is likely the best way to go because they're ahead of the curve, and fighting hard to stay there. But the question is whether Netflix will guarantee a big base amount + cut of subs, or if the WWE only gets a cut of the subs if it's a premium "channel" within Netflix.

 

Or if the "WWE Network" is even a premium in Netflix.

[KrisZ]

Netflix has never run live events either so that would be new

[BlueGuy]

Netflix has never run live events either so that would be new

And most likely something they're not equipped to do.