17 Ways WWE Has Changed Since It Was The WWF
2. The Death Of Pay-Per-View...
WWE swore blind that pay-per-view as a model was stone dead by the time they were ready to move away from it entirely in 2014, and whilst they jumped the gun in cannibalising a corner of their business entirely, the differences were rapidly felt as soon as their grand plan was fully fleshed out.
It was odd and a little sad to see the decline occur, but WWE had inadvertently manufactured it by resolutely refusing to change with the growing consumer choices out their beyond what had once been a solid business bedrock. In a misunderstood effort to send customers to their new service, the company actively mocked those still shelling out the old-fashioned way.
Monthly investments of $20+ for shows that had every chance of falling below the standards of any given good Monday Night Raws was unsustainable, but only because said standards fell in the first place. Futureproofing the B-shows in particular with the Network subscription ensured some customers were paying for them even if they weren't actively engaging - something useful for the organisation when it came to dining out on numbers when shareholders required return on their own investments.