WWE Survey Fans On 205 Live
Could results decide future of the brand?
To mark one year since the launch of cruiso-centric division 205 Live, WWE today circulated a Fan Council Survey to assess just how high levels of interest are in the purple brand.
The questionnaire is largely comprised of queries about viewing habits, with posers including:
- 'How often, if ever, do you watch 205 Live?
- 'In your own words, please share why you have not watched 205 Live.'
And the oddly passive-aggressive:
- 'Why have you not watched or are not regularly watching 205 Live?(!)'
It's difficult not to draw a number of inferences from these questions, chiefly that the company are unhappy with the programme's current viewership numbers and are hoping to change that. It's no secret that the Network's weekly hour of high-flying hijinks has struggled to gain traction, hardlyhelped by the fact it's taped before a dead crowd post SmackDown and is constantly treated as an afterthought during its supposed show-reel segments on Raw.
The company has made clear mistakes with the brand from the start - not least fifteen minute delays before every match to pointlessly turn the place purple, The most notable has been a glaring lack of identity, with the show often coming across like a lightweight version of any other WWE presentation. Personality has been in short supply also, and though Enzo Amore's transferal has remedied that to a degree, it has come at the cost of undermining the wrestling integrity of the entire division.
What WWE plans to do with the results of their survey are unknown, but it'd be a curious step to promote Hideo Itami's debut and bolster the numbers with the likes of Rockstar Spud if they planned to nix it any time soon.