Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Yes, that bitch Linda McMahon announced that all PPV's would stop being free in the UK from 2005, ending an era when we have had free PPV's for nigh on 17 years now, well fuck em, at least I've got the wrestling channel to watch instead of that. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest INXS Report post Posted June 23, 2004 There is no way i'm paying £15 to watch a WWE PPV every month. This is going to kill the UK market for them. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Dazed Report post Posted June 23, 2004 This will never work out. People just aren't willing to pay for something that's always been free. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Well its more than 12 now isnt it, cos they've got those midweek ones coming up as well, see, I dont get this, surely they cant expect people who are also staying up to 4am, to pay for it, they will just get them from traders the next day. I also wonder whether doing the Raw and Smackdown from the UK in October has anything to do with this as a way of buttering us up? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest INXS Report post Posted June 23, 2004 I'll be ebaying them that's for sure. WWE surely must realize that their core market in England is 12-16 year olds that have very little disposable income. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Well, Raw gets about 300,000 viewers on average in the UK, the live shows(summerslam et al) do slightly better at about 450,000 viewers, now if you take the US model, about 4-5 million people watch raw, and a good ppv buyrate(i think) is about 600,000. That is about 15% of the audience roughly, 15% of 300,000 is roundabout 45,000 buys, now taking into account the late starting times, round about 1am - 4am, I reckon you can knock about 5,000 buys off that, which comes in at about 40,000buys, now Sky would charge £14.99 for each PPV so that would make about £596.000 in revenue, times that by 16 would be £9,593,600 in revenue, now the new sky contract is rumoured to be at about £65 million pounds, this would mean that Sky would face a significant drop in revenue from advertising, and the PPV's. Im surprised Sky went in for this deal to be honest, Im surprised they didnt think about dropping it altoghter. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Toxxic 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Which of course sucks bigtime. I mght buy Wrestlemania, maybe the Rumble... anything else can fuck off. It's not that I can't afford to buy them, but I'm not paying that much for shit. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
caboose 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 The Royal Rumble and Wrestlemania are the only two I will but regardless of what the card. The rest will be judged on individual merit, so just like GAB this week, I wont be buying any Smackdown PPV's in the forseeable future. I'm surprised Sky went for this as well, I reckon it'll be dropped soon after. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King Cucaracha 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Oh great. Perfect way to increase your viewing figures. Wrestling Channel it is I guess...quarter-hourly commercials and all. And DVD for any events that happen to be decent. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest ravman77 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 Add me to the list. I pay enough for Sky Sports as it is. The shit they've (WWE) have been putting on recently, they should be grateful I'm watching at all. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
2GOLD 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 I get the feeling the WWE is so far out of touch with reality now. Sometimes greed can be your worst enemy and this just screams of big mistake. Big ole slap in the face to the UK fans since they really wouldn't make much money anyway on PPV in the UK. Sell out a whole country of fans for chump change, good plan. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
caboose 0 Report post Posted June 23, 2004 I know its not a direct issue but its not even like they've got any huge British wrestlers for us to get all patriotic about and get behind. Regal is cool and all, but lets not for a second think he's close to Bulldog levels where they could sell a whole show of his back, when the rest of the card is crap. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest INXS Report post Posted June 24, 2004 As I think about it, perhaps it's not WWE's decision here. SKY have the prgramming rights so perhaps it was their own idea to charge for the PPV's? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Dazed Report post Posted June 24, 2004 WWE's greed was the reason that Armageddon was never shown - they wanted a higher percentage of revenue than Sky were willing to give. I'm unwilling to give them the benefit of the doubt this time around. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Si82 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 That great isn't it. Fuck WWE. What really pissed me off i the fact that becuase, for some reason, ntl won't allow me to tape PPV events so I had to stay up until 4am to watch any of them. That really pisses me off. Anyway, fuck WWE. I don't even have Sky Sports anymore and I don't really miss it. I do have a question though. Does anyone know were I can get WWE PPV's here in the UK after they've been shown. Eg. e-Bay etc... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Jim Ross Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Its quite difficult getting WWF tapes from Ebay now. Everyone I know has had their items removed. I think our only options now are to hope a friend records it, or to see if you can download it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 That great isn't it. Fuck WWE. What really pissed me off i the fact that becuase, for some reason, ntl won't allow me to tape PPV events so I had to stay up until 4am to watch any of them. That really pisses me off. Anyway, fuck WWE. I don't even have Sky Sports anymore and I don't really miss it. I do have a question though. Does anyone know were I can get WWE PPV's here in the UK after they've been shown. Eg. e-Bay etc... In no way shilling, but I know a guy who will sell them to you for £4 in the UK, add this msn name to your list [email protected], ive bought a fair few events off him and he's totally sound. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 As I think about it, perhaps it's not WWE's decision here. SKY have the prgramming rights so perhaps it was their own idea to charge for the PPV's? As I heard it, WWE a: wanted a huge increase in the price of the contract and b: would not allow sky sports to show PPV's on national tv and if they did, then WWE would simply refuse to sell it to them, which is another way WWE is shooting themselves in the foot, as they simply arent popular over here as goes viewing figures, no other tv company would even look at them. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Zorin Industries 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Fuck that, I'd rather watch the wrestling channel now anyway, its great to finally see all those indy shows and talent i've heard so much about Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest INXS Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Its quite difficult getting WWF tapes from Ebay now. Everyone I know has had their items removed. I think our only options now are to hope a friend records it, or to see if you can download it. Yea, I was winning a bid on Ebay for Bad Blood when the sods removed the listing. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
haVoc 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Why did you get the PPV's for free in the first place? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Dark Age 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Because we have to stay up until 4am to watch the shows and the amount of buyers over here would be very small. Very few people would pay for a monthly show. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
landy1987 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 I think we have been very lucky for several years getting these PPVs for free, in the U.S, Canada, Australia, Germany and other countries they have to pay a whole lot to watch these PPVs, so I don't see why people are complaining as we all knew this was going to happen eventually anyway Personally, I don't really mind because normally when the PPVs are on I watch them once and that's it, and have never watched them again since, and so nwo I can just order the PPVs I want to see which sound decent. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Dr. Wrestlingphysics Report post Posted June 24, 2004 Another reason we got them for free is that Sky TV was prepared to pay good money for them and the old WWF/E thinking was that sky paid more than they could hope to make back in ppv revenue. They've now obviously gone mental and think they can make more this way. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
deancoles 0 Report post Posted June 24, 2004 On the subject of PPVs in the UK, does anyone know why WCW refused to show their PPVs over here? Off topic did Nitro on TNT ever get more viewers than Raw Is War on Sky Sports? I remember powerslam saying that WCW didn't have a single victory in our "Friday Night Wars".Wouldn't surprise me because while the WWF was doing specials on QVC over here and tours WCW did nothing in terms of tours or merchandising and I never saw the WCW magazine in a shop until 2000. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Jim Ross Report post Posted June 25, 2004 they used to show WCW on ITV about 4am Saturday Morning. It was only WCW Worldwide, and it was lousy.. this was circa 1990 if i recall. At that time they were selling WCW Magazine over here and the Wrestling Figures and WCW Ring. I had the ring and a Sid Vicious figure. Far inferior to the WWF ones because they were as stiff as a board. That was the last WCW Merchandise is saw at the time until i saw a few WCW Superstar Series tapes in a shop in 2000 or so. WCW has always been subjected to lousy screen times. In the late 80s it was shown at midnight on Eurosport (NWA World Wide), then it was on ITV at 4am (WCW Worldwide) then we got back-to-back Nitro and Thunder on TCM to go up against RAW on a Friday. So anyone who actually wanted to tune in really had to make some sort of sacrifice. SO the lousy showings meant there wouldnt be a big enough audience to want to see a PPV i guess. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
KTID 0 Report post Posted June 25, 2004 Off topic did Nitro on TNT ever get more viewers than Raw Is War on Sky Sports? nope. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vanhalen 0 Report post Posted June 25, 2004 Off topic did Nitro on TNT ever get more viewers than Raw Is War on Sky Sports? Nah, they made the stupid mistake of putting it on head to head with Raw and got absolutly destroyed, viewing vigures were about 40,000/show. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
King Cucaracha 0 Report post Posted June 25, 2004 Meh. I always used to tape Nitro so I could skim the crap and watch Raw. Still watched both, for the majority of the time. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest RickyB Report post Posted June 25, 2004 That's just retarded, they don't get near enough viewers to make money off the PPV's, especially not viewers who are willing to stay up till 4AM to watch a PPV, especially considering we have to pay a lot to get Sky Sports in the first place. Oh well, I guess i'll just watch the Wrestling Channel and maybe buy Wrestlemania if the card looks good and borrow tapes of the other shows. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
