saintpat
El Dandy
Release the hounds!!!
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Post by saintpat on Apr 3, 2017 22:53:43 GMT -5
I do agree to some extent that the fans are not always right. Just because we want something doesn't mean it makes sense from a booking perspective. If booking was as easy as just giving everyone what they wanted, I doubt WWE would f*** it up so badly all the time. I think a good example of how catering to the fans don't always work out was the Ryder push. People kept chanting "we want Ryder", but when they actually got him, they didn't seem to care much. They thought it was more funny to "want Ryder" than actually getting him. I also agree with JBL that Roman Reigns is an amazing wrestler, but I think it's childish for WWE to not admit that they have booked him wrong. If they just kept him as the silent badass, he would probably be the most over superstar in the company at this point, but they f***ed it up by booking him as a cheeky face (the only kind of face they seem capable of writing these days). They should have at least admitted that they made a mistake, but WWE has always been shit at showing humility in that regard, I think it’s because Vince is not the kind of guy to ever apologize for anything. I don't think it's necessary or would even be smart for VKM or the company to hold a press conference, do an interview or even send out a press release saying, "We admit that we booked Roman wrong, we're going to book him differently going forward." To comment on booking and break kayfabe to that extent is drawing back the curtain too far, and would make fans less likely to accept any change IMO. But it seems that very subtly, silently, they have shifted back toward the "silent badass" character more. And it doesn't seem to be making any headway, judging from what we've seen. He is also acting more and more like a heel -- his last "This is my yard" promo before WM and the one tonight were very, very heelish, and he wrestled more as a heel against Taker than we've seen. I kinda sorta wanted the "full heel turn" before, but after seeing it happen live and thinking about it a little bit, I don't think RR kicking Taker in the balls to win or breaking out brass knucks or whatever would have really been the way to go. He beat down an old man and tonight he basked in it. I see comments all the time talking about how characters in top TV shows (Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad) aren't just black and white. Roman's character certainly isn't written on that level -- nor is WWE, but those shows don't have to have a feud every three-four weeks to carry PPVs and sell network subs, either, so there are differences (Walter White couldn't do a plancha to save his life, so there) -- but Roman isn't fully face or fully heel right now. I don't see him as "Cena 2.0" anymore. Giving people "what they want" isn't always the way to go. There's an instant gratification and there's long-term payoff. I recall VERY clearly that this board was VERY upset that DB didn't get his championship and overcome the Authority earlier -- which would have cost us the greatest WM payoff of our time. I'm glad WWE didn't listen to that. Ask an 8-year-old and he will tell you he wants ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day. Give him ice cream three meals a day and he'll soon tire of ice cream. Give it to him every once in a while on special occasions and he'll apreciate it more.
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Post by Final Countdown Jones on Apr 3, 2017 23:04:35 GMT -5
If the WWE always listened to the fans and changed booking on the fly rather than stuck to its guns, New Day would have been a New New Nation ripoff and almost certianly would have never gotten over. People screamed for Daniel Bryan to be "American Dragon" and would have been a 5-foot-8, 180-pound 'monster' kicking heads in rather than becoming a loveable underdog who became the biggest draw and most popular wrestler in recent memory. Those are just a couple of examples. Wait, so the acts you're citing as 'reasons the fans are wrong and shouldn't be listened to' are: -The guy who WWE was content with using as an upper midcarder and even made a story about him not being good enough for the main event that took off so much the company was basically held at gunpoint to change the main event of Wrestlemania to what ended up being the best received ending to a Mania they've had in years-A tag team act that was an entirely Vince McMahon creation and seen as a played-totally-straight happy babyface act, which ended up turning heel because the fans hated them, and then only once fan reaction was listened to did the team find their stride and end up so over they were turned face again over it. In being turned they became a merch powerhouse because the initial plans had been rejected and they were able to become something better and more natural for their roles than the awful shit creative had cooked up Yeah, those are some real good examples of why the crowd should be ignored.
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Post by rocnsoc88 on Apr 3, 2017 23:06:04 GMT -5
But while the IWC -- or whatever you want to call people on message boards -- is perpetually angry/upset/dissatisfied, the majority of people are not. At most, several hundred people post on boards about how much they don't like what's going on, maybe a few thousand if you count YouTube comments and Facebook and Tweets. And people who are unhappy are way more likely to post repeatedly about their gripes than people who are satisfied. However ... The Network is basically at 2 million subscribers (just short by numbers released today). WrestleMania had 75,000 people in attendance and Raw is certainly sold out, as was NXT Takeover. More people attend WWE live events in any given week (not even counting WM or the other Big Three PPVs) than complain on social media about the product. Someone is buying all those Roman Reigns shirts. I see a lot of internet "hate" for Enzo and Cass, Brock, the Four Horsewomen (even Becky to a certain degree) and a lot of other acts that seem to be pretty over by judging the crowd reaction. For years there was an "anybody but Cena" mantra, and he began to take a back seat from the title scene, started to become more of a part-timer, repeatedly put people over (Punk, Bryan, AJ -- among those most liked by the IWC) ... but the "WWE that doesn't listen to the fans" meme ignores this. I'm watching a Raw main event between four indie darlings -- Samoa Joe, Rollins, Finn and Kevin Owens. Those things seem like a "WWE that listens" to me. If the WWE always listened to the fans and changed booking on the fly rather than stuck to its guns, New Day would have been a New New Nation ripoff and almost certianly would have never gotten over. People screamed for Daniel Bryan to be "American Dragon" and would have been a 5-foot-8, 180-pound 'monster' kicking heads in rather than becoming a loveable underdog who became the biggest draw and most popular wrestler in recent memory. Those are just a couple of examples. Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target. At one time Dolph Ziggler was hugely popular with the Internet forums. So was Zack Ryder. Also Ambrose and others. But the 'vocal dissatisfied' fan base is fickle and they change on a dime. Pretty much this, the smartest response to my feelings on the product and the IWC I usually don't post here, but this was such an egregious example of someone defending WWE's indefensible booking that I had to respond. It's completely bizarre that you would use New Day as an example of why WWE shouldn't listen to their fans....because New Day is a PITCH PERFECT example of what listening to fans can get WWE. They were a laughably horrible babyface act at first that the fans weren't having. Then the WWE listened and turned them heel. They got mega-heat for several months before becoming so entertaining that they started to get cheered. So they then became one of the most over babyface tag team acts that I can ever remember. That they've lost a lot of steam just recently is beside the point. But that's exactly what's happened. Both house show attendance and television ratings have really taken a beating in the last couple of years. I'm not totally blaming it on Roman, but if his babyface push were actually working, would both those things be happening?
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saintpat
El Dandy
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Post by saintpat on Apr 3, 2017 23:24:28 GMT -5
If the WWE always listened to the fans and changed booking on the fly rather than stuck to its guns, New Day would have been a New New Nation ripoff and almost certianly would have never gotten over. People screamed for Daniel Bryan to be "American Dragon" and would have been a 5-foot-8, 180-pound 'monster' kicking heads in rather than becoming a loveable underdog who became the biggest draw and most popular wrestler in recent memory. Those are just a couple of examples. Wait, so the acts you're citing as 'reasons the fans are wrong and shouldn't be listened to' are: -The guy who WWE was content with using as an upper midcarder and even made a story about him not being good enough for the main event that took off so much the company was basically held at gunpoint to change the main event of Wrestlemania to what ended up being the best received ending to a Mania they've had in years-A tag team act that was an entirely Vince McMahon creation and seen as a played-totally-straight happy babyface act, which ended up turning heel because the fans hated them, and then only once fan reaction was listened to did the team find their stride and end up so over they were turned face again over it. In being turned they became a merch powerhouse because the initial plans had been rejected and they were able to become something better and more natural for their roles than the awful shit creative had cooked up Yeah, those are some real good examples of why the crowd should be ignored. WWE did listen in the case of Bryan. You just said so. So, yes, it's a good example -- especially since I specifically said not listening to the cries and crowning him several months earlier (at which point they had obviously made up their minds to change directions -- they even did a fake fan takeover in the ring for goodness sake) was the right move. And the guy went 77-5 over 14 months leading up to WM, and those B-plus player promos WERE designed to get him sympathy and get him over. (The CHANGE was that they originally thought The Authority could heel it up and humiliate much of the babyface roster and that the parts were interchangeable, but they realized when doing it to Big Show didn't get him anywhere that Bryan was a special case ... it took time, but they listened and catapulted him to the top, but they clearly used those 'you're not good enough' promos for a purpose long before the payoff.) And I also pointed to Bryan as American Dragon, which just isn't going to work when he's a super-small, MMA-style badass who's supposed to be kicking the tar out of guys much more physically imposing right out of the gate and booked as if he's Samoa Joe. He can beat those guys though sheer determination, wrestling ability and cunning, but his indie act where he's doing that mostly to guys his own size isn't going to fly as a character out of the gate. I'll 100 percent stand by that. And people wanted New Day to be New Nation. They wanted a militant black faction. WWE had a completely different vision and it did take off. The crowd didn't like them BECAUSE THEY WERE POSITIVE and happy, which is a joke itself. But somehow it worked. If WWE had listened to the fans, it would ahve (a) really worked out well when the whole Black Lives Matter really began to become a thing, and (b) a PG-era racial militant stable was NOT going to get over. The fans were wrong.
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saintpat
El Dandy
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Post by saintpat on Apr 3, 2017 23:28:19 GMT -5
Pretty much this, the smartest response to my feelings on the product and the IWC I usually don't post here, but this was such an egregious example of someone defending WWE's indefensible booking that I had to respond. It's completely bizarre that you would use New Day as an example of why WWE shouldn't listen to their fans....because New Day is a PITCH PERFECT example of what listening to fans can get WWE. They were a laughably horrible babyface act at first that the fans weren't having. Then the WWE listened and turned them heel. They got mega-heat for several months before becoming so entertaining that they started to get cheered. So they then became one of the most over babyface tag team acts that I can ever remember. That they've lost a lot of steam just recently is beside the point. But that's exactly what's happened. Both house show attendance and television ratings have really taken a beating in the last couple of years. I'm not totally blaming it on Roman, but if his babyface push were actually working, would both those things be happening? Yes. Cable audience is dropping off a cliff. Give me three examples of shows that have been around for a long time (say 5 years or more where there's a real baseline) that have rising or even steadily holding audience (number of viewers). ESPN is losing HALF A MILLION SUBSCRIBERS PER MONTH right now. Cord cutting is a thing. Do some research on declining television audience. And yet wrestling fans think Roman Reigns is to blame? Does he also sneak over to Monday Night Football (head to head with Raw) and tank their ratings, too? As for live attendance, total attendance for the first six months of 2016 was higher than for the first six months of 2015. (Quick google, this was the first stockholder report on this that I could find.) Average attendance was down about 200 per event. REVENUE from live events was up MORE THAN TEN MILLION DOLLARS. So what happened was that they raised prices (it's in the report) and traded off a few seats in attendance for more money. It's like upping the price of hamburgers by $2 and selling less burgers but making more money. It's called business.
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Post by EoE: Well There's Your Problem on Apr 3, 2017 23:28:57 GMT -5
I feel like fans only wanted an actual New Nation just to validate a meme, not out of any legitimate desire to see one.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 3, 2017 23:29:04 GMT -5
Giving people "what they want" isn't always the way to go. There's an instant gratification and there's long-term payoff. I recall VERY clearly that this board was VERY upset that DB didn't get his championship and overcome the Authority earlier -- which would have cost us the greatest WM payoff of our time. I'm glad WWE didn't listen to that. Ask an 8-year-old and he will tell you he wants ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day. Give him ice cream three meals a day and he'll soon tire of ice cream. Give it to him every once in a while on special occasions and he'll apreciate it more. I'm in rabid agreement with much of what you've been saying up to here. With Daniel Bryan I thought that instance was extremely negligent of WWE. WWE pretty much charted a course for Wrestlemania the moment that Triple H turned on him and the Authority made his life misterable, then when they were 3/4ths the way there, they got cold feet for some reason and went the Batista route. The wrestling company/wrestling fan relationship is very strange, and I think for the most part lately fans are forgetting the fun of being in the passenger's seat, and try way, way too hard to control the direction of things themselves. With Daniel Bryan, it was just so obvious what audiences wanted at Wrestlemania, and WWE had already learned some hard lessons about stifling Daniel Bryan. I didn't think fans were asking too much in this case, where WWE is basically being told "we like what you're doing with Daniel Bryan, we would like him to main event Wrestlemania." People just wanted them to finish what they started. I think that moment would have been just as memorable if they complied, and they'd probably be better for it, because the fan/promotion relationship got so rocky by that point and WWE conceding that year opened the door to fans we get today who try to force the issue so often. It turned into some sort of hostage situation when it didn't have to be, and it sort of empowered fans in a way that made it seem like if they hoot and holler enough about anything then they can get anything they want. I think there are instances where WWE fans have the right to be chaffed about something, dropped storylines, false promises, outright bad storylines. But there are times where fans are out of line too. When people make blanket statements like "WWE hates its fans" it just comes off childish to me. Wrestling in general from one company to the next can be amazing one month and the complete shits the next. I think fans would benefit from removing the personal element from their relationship to whatever wrestling promotion they've married themselves to and just realize that none of them want to piss everyone off and try to compromise their vision with what fans want and it just doesn't line up sometimes. It never has to be a battle. People just end up looking like hypocrites when they paint the picture that WWE at large are treacherous villains, but still keep watching. If you just watch it, don't get too worked up about it and realize you're a passenger I think it's a lot easier to deal with.
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Post by Mayonnaise on Apr 3, 2017 23:31:02 GMT -5
WWE presents themselves as a "family" with the "if one fails, we all fail" mentality. If a significant number of people protest the company using their wallets, WWE will respond in one of two ways: they'll either continue to ignore that there is an issue, or they'll try to repair the issue. If the company actually starts hemorrhaging money, people beyond Vince, Hunter, and Stephanie are motivated to change something. But while the IWC -- or whatever you want to call people on message boards -- is perpetually angry/upset/dissatisfied, the majority of people are not. At most, several hundred people post on boards about how much they don't like what's going on, maybe a few thousand if you count YouTube comments and Facebook and Tweets. And people who are unhappy are way more likely to post repeatedly about their gripes than people who are satisfied. However ... The Network is basically at 2 million subscribers (just short by numbers released today). WrestleMania had 75,000 people in attendance and Raw is certainly sold out, as was NXT Takeover. More people attend WWE live events in any given week (not even counting WM or the other Big Three PPVs) than complain on social media about the product. Someone is buying all those Roman Reigns shirts. I see a lot of internet "hate" for Enzo and Cass, Brock, the Four Horsewomen (even Becky to a certain degree) and a lot of other acts that seem to be pretty over by judging the crowd reaction. For years there was an "anybody but Cena" mantra, and he began to take a back seat from the title scene, started to become more of a part-timer, repeatedly put people over (Punk, Bryan, AJ -- among those most liked by the IWC) ... but the "WWE that doesn't listen to the fans" meme ignores this. I'm watching a Raw main event between four indie darlings -- Samoa Joe, Rollins, Finn and Kevin Owens. Those things seem like a "WWE that listens" to me. If the WWE always listened to the fans and changed booking on the fly rather than stuck to its guns, New Day would have been a New New Nation ripoff and almost certianly would have never gotten over. People screamed for Daniel Bryan to be "American Dragon" and would have been a 5-foot-8, 180-pound 'monster' kicking heads in rather than becoming a loveable underdog who became the biggest draw and most popular wrestler in recent memory. Those are just a couple of examples. Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target. At one time Dolph Ziggler was hugely popular with the Internet forums. So was Zack Ryder. Also Ambrose and others. But the 'vocal dissatisfied' fan base is fickle and they change on a dime. Sorry but the majority of people have fled WWE and dropped their ratings and attendance at all time lows outside of these major travel weekends. They drove millions away with the Cena push and more with the Roman push. You can call bullshit all you want on people still buying things, revenues being up but numbers don't lie. They are charging more to their hardcore base because we are stupid, gullible, or in love with this crap enough to make up for the 3 million people that have fled in 3 years. You say the indie signings are a sign of them listening ignoring their plan to create their own guys in FCW failed miserably and they had to start signing people who knew how to wrestle, I mean how many times to guys like Joe and KO have to talk about WWE having no interest in them until recently does it take to see they had to make a major shift in plans because they failed? Finally, "Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target." YOU'RE GODDAMNED RIGHT. Maybe you haven't realized it but we're not a hive mind. Despite the propaganda pushed by some, we are all people with our own opinions and to say or even act like we all wanted one thing or got behind one idea is a failure on your part and betrays any point you had, which you thankfully had none.
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saintpat
El Dandy
Release the hounds!!!
Posts: 7,664
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Post by saintpat on Apr 3, 2017 23:42:34 GMT -5
But while the IWC -- or whatever you want to call people on message boards -- is perpetually angry/upset/dissatisfied, the majority of people are not. At most, several hundred people post on boards about how much they don't like what's going on, maybe a few thousand if you count YouTube comments and Facebook and Tweets. And people who are unhappy are way more likely to post repeatedly about their gripes than people who are satisfied. However ... The Network is basically at 2 million subscribers (just short by numbers released today). WrestleMania had 75,000 people in attendance and Raw is certainly sold out, as was NXT Takeover. More people attend WWE live events in any given week (not even counting WM or the other Big Three PPVs) than complain on social media about the product. Someone is buying all those Roman Reigns shirts. I see a lot of internet "hate" for Enzo and Cass, Brock, the Four Horsewomen (even Becky to a certain degree) and a lot of other acts that seem to be pretty over by judging the crowd reaction. For years there was an "anybody but Cena" mantra, and he began to take a back seat from the title scene, started to become more of a part-timer, repeatedly put people over (Punk, Bryan, AJ -- among those most liked by the IWC) ... but the "WWE that doesn't listen to the fans" meme ignores this. I'm watching a Raw main event between four indie darlings -- Samoa Joe, Rollins, Finn and Kevin Owens. Those things seem like a "WWE that listens" to me. If the WWE always listened to the fans and changed booking on the fly rather than stuck to its guns, New Day would have been a New New Nation ripoff and almost certianly would have never gotten over. People screamed for Daniel Bryan to be "American Dragon" and would have been a 5-foot-8, 180-pound 'monster' kicking heads in rather than becoming a loveable underdog who became the biggest draw and most popular wrestler in recent memory. Those are just a couple of examples. Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target. At one time Dolph Ziggler was hugely popular with the Internet forums. So was Zack Ryder. Also Ambrose and others. But the 'vocal dissatisfied' fan base is fickle and they change on a dime. Sorry but the majority of people have fled WWE and dropped their ratings and attendance at all time lows outside of these major travel weekends. They drove millions away with the Cena push and more with the Roman push. You can call bullshit all you want on people still buying things, revenues being up but numbers don't lie. They are charging more to their hardcore base because we are stupid, gullible, or in love with this crap enough to make up for the 3 million people that have fled in 3 years. You say the indie signings are a sign of them listening ignoring their plan to create their own guys in FCW failed miserably and they had to start signing people who knew how to wrestle, I mean how many times to guys like Joe and KO have to talk about WWE having no interest in them until recently does it take to see they had to make a major shift in plans because they failed? Finally, "Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target." YOU'RE GODDAMNED RIGHT. Maybe you haven't realized it but we're not a hive mind. Despite the propaganda pushed by some, we are all people with our own opinions and to say or even act like we all wanted one thing or got behind one idea is a failure on your part and betrays any point you had, which you thankfully had none. I had a point and I've made it. If you disagree, that's fine. But you are incorrect to say I didn't. Read some of the replies -- some people agree with my points, others do not. Yes, there are differences within the IWC. I never said there was a hivemind. But you get to say that people who like wrestling and go to shows are stupid and gullible? None of them are happy with the product but the do it anyway. Are they zombies? I don't think so. That sounds like more of a hivemind description than anything I wrote. But WWE cannot please everyone all the time. You or someone else (a lot of someone elses) may not like Roman Reigns, but some people actually do. I went to WM with two of them. There were three people in my section in front of me (not kids) dressed as RR. As I noted, someone is buying those shirts and making him the No. 1 merch seller on the active roster. To conclude that WWE isn't listening to its audience is to say that those who buy merch and attend events aren't really part of the audience -- or at least not a part that should count -- but people who post on message boards (and often brag that they don't watch the product or use illegal streams to watch it for free) are somehow the part of the audience that should be listened to. That doesn't strike me as a sound business model. EDIT: GIYF - Average attendance in the first six months of 2015 and 2016 was above 8,000, and above 6,000 in the U.S. Average attendance in the mid-1990s was below 4,000. So this all-time low seems to be, well, incorrect: sites.google.com/site/chrisharrington/wwe_1994_2012_attendancewww.pwtorch.com/site/2016/07/28/wwe-q2-2016-full-live-events-revenue-attendance-break-first-half-2016-wrestlemania-offsets-soft-domestic-business-plus-solid-intl-growth/
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Post by Mayonnaise on Apr 3, 2017 23:56:32 GMT -5
Sorry but the majority of people have fled WWE and dropped their ratings and attendance at all time lows outside of these major travel weekends. They drove millions away with the Cena push and more with the Roman push. You can call bullshit all you want on people still buying things, revenues being up but numbers don't lie. They are charging more to their hardcore base because we are stupid, gullible, or in love with this crap enough to make up for the 3 million people that have fled in 3 years. You say the indie signings are a sign of them listening ignoring their plan to create their own guys in FCW failed miserably and they had to start signing people who knew how to wrestle, I mean how many times to guys like Joe and KO have to talk about WWE having no interest in them until recently does it take to see they had to make a major shift in plans because they failed? Finally, "Who and what the IWC wants (or says it wants) is a moving target." YOU'RE GODDAMNED RIGHT. Maybe you haven't realized it but we're not a hive mind. Despite the propaganda pushed by some, we are all people with our own opinions and to say or even act like we all wanted one thing or got behind one idea is a failure on your part and betrays any point you had, which you thankfully had none. I had a point and I've made it. If you disagree, that's fine. But you are incorrect to say I didn't. Read some of the replies -- some people agree with my points, others do not. Yes, there are differences within the IWC. I never said there was a hivemind. But you get to say that people who like wrestling and go to shows are stupid and gullible? None of them are happy with the product but the do it anyway. Are they zombies? I don't think so. That sounds like more of a hivemind description than anything I wrote. But WWE cannot please everyone all the time. You or someone else (a lot of someone elses) may not like Roman Reigns, but some people actually do. I went to WM with two of them. There were three people in my section in front of me (not kids) dressed as RR. As I noted, someone is buying those shirts and making him the No. 1 merch seller on the active roster. To conclude that WWE isn't listening to its audience is to say that those who buy merch and attend events aren't really part of the audience -- or at least not a part that should count -- but people who post on message boards (and often brag that they don't watch the product or use illegal streams to watch it for free) are somehow the part of the audience that should be listened to. That doesn't strike me as a sound business model. Stupid, gullible or in love. Clear difference as you don't have to be stupid, you don't have to be gullible and you don't have to be in love with it but you are with out a doubt at least one if you're a hardcore fan. The rest is just saying over and over that people don't like Roman have no place since you say WWE listens to the live crowd when we have clear evidence they don't based on the crowds that have given WWE their largest and most profitable audiences and follow it up by saying that those who don't fall under the banner you drag are torrent using, illegal method abusing people to write it all off. You like Roman, good for you but this idea you're pushing of those that don't like him don't matter is shit. That is exactly what you've expresses, and that is why you don't have a point to stand on.
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Reflecto
Hank Scorpio
The Sorceress' Knight
Posts: 6,847
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Post by Reflecto on Apr 4, 2017 0:53:46 GMT -5
Tonight on Raw, fans celebrated the end of the Undertaker by dropping so many F-bombs they put up a TV-PG guideline after every commercial break.
Last night, a fan put out- and is on this very board, a sign accusing Reigns of being a Holocaust denier.
And if it's just Reigns? Two weeks before that, after one of the biggest invasions of privacy a WWE superstar got, the crowd serenaded people with mockery and making fun of being the victim of a breach of privacy.
...so why the hell SHOULD WWE do the things we want? We don't DESERVE IT....if anything WWE should do the opposite of what we want.
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Post by TWERKIN' MAGGLE on Apr 4, 2017 1:03:17 GMT -5
Tonight on Raw, fans celebrated the end of the Undertaker by dropping so many F-bombs they put up a TV-PG guideline after every commercial break. Last night, a fan put out- and is on this very board, a sign accusing Reigns of being a Holocaust denier. And if it's just Reigns? Two weeks before that, after one of the biggest invasions of privacy a WWE superstar got, the crowd serenaded people with mockery and making fun of being the victim of a breach of privacy. ...so why the hell SHOULD WWE do the things we want? We don't DESERVE IT....if anything WWE should do the opposite of what we want. I'm not even going to bother. Bottom line, the IWC is not a hive mind and this "we" you're presenting is wrong.
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Post by Final Countdown Jones on Apr 4, 2017 7:01:41 GMT -5
Wait, so the acts you're citing as 'reasons the fans are wrong and shouldn't be listened to' are: -The guy who WWE was content with using as an upper midcarder and even made a story about him not being good enough for the main event that took off so much the company was basically held at gunpoint to change the main event of Wrestlemania to what ended up being the best received ending to a Mania they've had in years-A tag team act that was an entirely Vince McMahon creation and seen as a played-totally-straight happy babyface act, which ended up turning heel because the fans hated them, and then only once fan reaction was listened to did the team find their stride and end up so over they were turned face again over it. In being turned they became a merch powerhouse because the initial plans had been rejected and they were able to become something better and more natural for their roles than the awful shit creative had cooked up Yeah, those are some real good examples of why the crowd should be ignored. WWE did listen in the case of Bryan. You just said so. So, yes, it's a good example -- especially since I specifically said not listening to the cries and crowning him several months earlier (at which point they had obviously made up their minds to change directions -- they even did a fake fan takeover in the ring for goodness sake) was the right move. And the guy went 77-5 over 14 months leading up to WM, and those B-plus player promos WERE designed to get him sympathy and get him over. (The CHANGE was that they originally thought The Authority could heel it up and humiliate much of the babyface roster and that the parts were interchangeable, but they realized when doing it to Big Show didn't get him anywhere that Bryan was a special case ... it took time, but they listened and catapulted him to the top, but they clearly used those 'you're not good enough' promos for a purpose long before the payoff.) And I also pointed to Bryan as American Dragon, which just isn't going to work when he's a super-small, MMA-style badass who's supposed to be kicking the tar out of guys much more physically imposing right out of the gate and booked as if he's Samoa Joe. He can beat those guys though sheer determination, wrestling ability and cunning, but his indie act where he's doing that mostly to guys his own size isn't going to fly as a character out of the gate. I'll 100 percent stand by that. And people wanted New Day to be New Nation. They wanted a militant black faction. WWE had a completely different vision and it did take off. The crowd didn't like them BECAUSE THEY WERE POSITIVE and happy, which is a joke itself. But somehow it worked. If WWE had listened to the fans, it would ahve (a) really worked out well when the whole Black Lives Matter really began to become a thing, and (b) a PG-era racial militant stable was NOT going to get over. The fans were wrong. You're using justifications for why these guys are cases against listening to the fans when they are cases for listening to the fans by focusing on the issue on a micro and personal level instead of the macro level. Yeah, some people did genuinely wish for a more gritty and charged New Nation-esque gimmick for New Day, but a lot of others didn't. More people, I think, just didn't like the lame-ass nonsense that New Day started as, and they booed accordingly. Didn't chant "New Nation" as a declaration they wanted specifically to see that gimmick, they chanted "New Day sucks" because pretty much across the board people were wildly unentertained. Not because they didn't give them a specific gimmick, but because it was bad. No, WWE's vision of three guys who were super happy and positive and getting people to clap did not take off. The crowd rejected it, and they turned heel, getting a bit more creative freedom because they weren't a major pet project anymore, and that's when they started putting something into their backstage Youtube segments that people latched onto, and it progressed until they were able to really start bringing that shit in. The version of the New Day that preached the power of positivity was shat on. The version of the New Day that was three nerds leaning on a lot of comedy stuff and Xavier dicking with a trombone got over. Those are in no way the same act, and it is an evolution born entirely out of the audience rejected what came before. Your win/loss figure over Bryan is still nonsense because it's robbed of context, but also ignores that over that 14 month span Bryan wasn't getting a main event push the whole damn time, and spent much of that period as tag team champion, racking up wins against other tag teams. The segments calling him a b-plus layer were designed to get him sympathy, sure. But sympathy for the Wyatt program they had penciled in for him, which was going to run through Mania and play out much like the current Orton program with him. It was only dropped and rushed due to Yes chants starting to break out during sports games, but even then they rushed it to have Bryan put Wyatt over and then eyed a Sheamus match for Mania. The real vitriol came not when they had not put the title back on him right away, but when he hadn't even entered the Rumble; people were 100% on board with a long term build over a few months toward him being given a big moment at Wrestlemania, and it's when they didn't get that and the main event seemed locked into place that people really started to rebel, because it seemed like it wasn't going to happen at Mania. A show that would be seven months after the initial Summerslam ignition of the storyline. But again, you're pinning a specific want onto the entire fanbase. Did some people want American Dragon-esque Bryan? Yes. Did an entire arena ever chant that they wanted him to be a killer? No. Listening to their audience isn't reading internet comments and picking up on the specific desires of however many people. But you're cherry picking weird revisionist versions of both of those changes to try and prove a point opposing what they actually prove. No shows were hijacked because people wanted a racially charged New Day or Bryan to do his indie gimmick. Segments were viscerally booed when New Day was bad and when Daniel Bryan was being pushed down the card. Segments are now viscerally booed when Roman Reigns comes out and he's supposed to be the face, because the arena audience is by and large rejecting him as a face. These are not small, specific wants on an image board you're cherry picking and blowing up, these are huge audience reactions, and in both of your examples, it was when the crowd response hit critical mass and they changed their booking that things turned out for the better.
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the2ndevil
Grimlock
Super Seducer Survivor
Where Is Your Santa, Now?
Posts: 13,629
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Post by the2ndevil on Apr 4, 2017 8:27:49 GMT -5
Tonight on Raw, fans celebrated the end of the Undertaker by dropping so many F-bombs they put up a TV-PG guideline after every commercial break. Last night, a fan put out- and is on this very board, a sign accusing Reigns of being a Holocaust denier. And if it's just Reigns? Two weeks before that, after one of the biggest invasions of privacy a WWE superstar got, the crowd serenaded people with mockery and making fun of being the victim of a breach of privacy. ...so why the hell SHOULD WWE do the things we want? We don't DESERVE IT....if anything WWE should do the opposite of what we want. I never got any TV-PG guideline thing when the show came back from commercial. Agree with the rest of your post to varying degrees.
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saintpat
El Dandy
Release the hounds!!!
Posts: 7,664
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Post by saintpat on Apr 4, 2017 9:12:13 GMT -5
I had a point and I've made it. If you disagree, that's fine. But you are incorrect to say I didn't. Read some of the replies -- some people agree with my points, others do not. Yes, there are differences within the IWC. I never said there was a hivemind. But you get to say that people who like wrestling and go to shows are stupid and gullible? None of them are happy with the product but the do it anyway. Are they zombies? I don't think so. That sounds like more of a hivemind description than anything I wrote. But WWE cannot please everyone all the time. You or someone else (a lot of someone elses) may not like Roman Reigns, but some people actually do. I went to WM with two of them. There were three people in my section in front of me (not kids) dressed as RR. As I noted, someone is buying those shirts and making him the No. 1 merch seller on the active roster. To conclude that WWE isn't listening to its audience is to say that those who buy merch and attend events aren't really part of the audience -- or at least not a part that should count -- but people who post on message boards (and often brag that they don't watch the product or use illegal streams to watch it for free) are somehow the part of the audience that should be listened to. That doesn't strike me as a sound business model. Stupid, gullible or in love. Clear difference as you don't have to be stupid, you don't have to be gullible and you don't have to be in love with it but you are with out a doubt at least one if you're a hardcore fan. The rest is just saying over and over that people don't like Roman have no place since you say WWE listens to the live crowd when we have clear evidence they don't based on the crowds that have given WWE their largest and most profitable audiences and follow it up by saying that those who don't fall under the banner you drag are torrent using, illegal method abusing people to write it all off. You like Roman, good for you but this idea you're pushing of those that don't like him don't matter is shit. That is exactly what you've expresses, and that is why you don't have a point to stand on. First, I'm not a big Roman fan. I'm rather indifferent to him -- I've enjoyed some of his matches but he's not who I'd most want to see as the top of the card or the face of the company. And where did I said that those who don't like him don't matter? I'm saying that those who do like him also matter, and there is undeniable evidence (merch sales being the most concrete) that there are plenty who do like him. I've made the same points about Cena -- if everyone hates Cena (and there have been more points than I can count over the years that have argued that the vast majority of the fan base hate him -- you said in a post earlier that he's driven away millions, for instance) then who is chanting "Let's Go Cena" for people to respond "Cena Sucks"? The "Cena Sucks" chant is a reply, a response, to people cheering for him. And how is it that he's sold more merch by far than anyone else on the roster if he's universally hated? I'm neither stupid, gullible nor in love with Roman. I like wrestling. I don't take it personally when the company doesn't choose "my guy" as the one to run with at the top of the card. Your argument in saying this -- that anyone who disagrees is stupid, or they're gullible, or they're 'in love' with WWE or Roman (and thus their judgment is clouded) is a nice way to set yourself up in a debate. In fact, it's actually what a lot of people here say the WWE does. Your 'audience' on this message board, the one that doesn't have a hivemind, surely isn't divided such that everyone who shares your point of view is smart and everyone who doesn't is an idiot?
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2017 9:23:52 GMT -5
The oft-shat on "Sufferin' succotash" line was weeks before the Rumble, and the whole "he's not Daniel Bryan" thing is one of the weirdest revisionist statements that keeps cropping up, but it's not true. Go back and watch the Rumble. People didn't respond well to Ambrose or Ziggler getting dumped out like yesterday's trash either. People didn't just turn on the match the moment Bryan was eliminated, and the Roman booing didn't just kick up the night of the Rumble when Daniel Bryan lost. People forget that Ambrose, Ziggler, Ryback and even Mizdow were ridiculously over when they entered that match and most of them I listed got barely any time to do anything. The moment Ziggler got cut off IMMIDIANTLY and tossed out by Big Show and Kane, the match had no hope of coming back. That Rumble wasn't the worst because Roman won, that Rumble sucked because in one night, they beat the hope out of the fans for who they liked and cheered for all to put over someone they didn't like. And even then, they did a disgraceful job at making HIM. There was at least 8 other men in that Rumble that the crowd would have wanted (Ambrose, Ziggler, Rusev, Wyatt, Ziggler, Cesaro, Mizdow, and maybe Swagger) to win. And when the Local Men just beat them up and casually tossed them out, it made things worse. Wyatt, in particular, was both the Iron Man & the guy with the most eliminations, and he was unceremoniously dumped out after a KO Punch. Again; WHY DO WE KEEP DUMBING DOWN THE ARGUMENT TO BRYAN VS. ROMAN?!! The real issue is that we have a company that openly fights tooth and nail against opinions all the time. Is the "IWC" and "smart" crowds a pain in the ass at times? Yes. Are there fans who cross the line? Absolutely. Does this mean our collective opinions are null and void & we must learn to embrace what the company offers us? Hell no. To a similar extent, I saw this with the last Super Smash Bros. games. There were varying opinions, but the arguments were dumbed down to where there was two sides; Masahiro Sakurai is a genius & all the people who aren't happy with character choices need to shut up and be grateful, dammit, or Masahiro Sakurai is an idiot who is putting personal biases above sound decisions & that if we choose not to pay, we are justified in our grievances. Naturally, arguments turned to name calling and contempt, with one side telling the other to "get over it" while the other insists their opposition is a hivemind. Can we discuss the big picture & not circle the drain about our personal preferences?
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TGM
Hank Scorpio
Posts: 6,073
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Post by TGM on Apr 4, 2017 9:25:37 GMT -5
I can't be bothered to find the post to quote it but I am laughing out loud and the guy who said there are a few hundred people at most that post on Internet message boards.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2017 10:49:33 GMT -5
Again; WHY DO WE KEEP DUMBING DOWN THE ARGUMENT TO BRYAN VS. ROMAN?!! The real issue is that we have a company that openly fights tooth and nail against opinions all the time. But even to say it's a "fight" is a matter of perspective. Are they fighting opinions or just putting on a show that doesn't jive with some people? How subservient do they need to be to everyone? Like the Daniel Bryan thing, I completely agree with anyone who says it was dumb as hell that they thought they could keep Daniel Bryan out of the Wrestlemania main event without a problem, but it is necessarily that WWE were "fighting" us? Or just an impersonal decision based on ratings and buyrates? Like when Bryan won the title at Summerslam and got screwed, and the buyrates for the event weren't impressive, I remember there was an interview where Vince referred to the event as "taking a chance on an attraction that failed." They obviously bowed out of Daniel Bryan due to business reasons, he doesn't fit what they want a main eventer to be, and he wasn't getting the results to justify going out of their way to make it work so they eased off. I do think this was a stupid thing to do and that box office stars aren't made over night, but I don't perceive this to be a malicious action. It's like the late night stuff when Conan took over the Tonight Show then lost it, and it turned into this online crusade like it was a matter of good and evil, when it's usually more complicated than that and not always as inhuman as it seems. I would take Conan over Leno any day, but they gave Jay Leno a deadline to retire, and when the time came he wasn't ready to retire, and Conan wasn't yielding the desired results, so they meddled around with both of them until Conan didn't want to play anymore, and as a fan it's frustrating to watch unfold, but I can definitely identify with Jay Leno's side, where he was on the top of his field and wasn't ready to let go, none of this had anything to do with the rest of us picking a side and turning it into a fight. Sometimes what we perceive as attacks against us when it comes to TV shows we like has nothing to do with us, really. And this Roman Reigns thing is no different than any other TV show. If someone makes a show about the Flash, and people don't like it, the only thing the people writing the Flash can do is keep trying to write the Flash character in ways that make people like him. WWE is doing that with Roman Reigns, they're not doing this to stick it to us. He's a wrestler the fits the mold of what WWE thinks their top guy should look like right now, it's a character they feel comfortable writing. They're not trying to pick a fight, they're just trying to find a way to present him so we won't hate him so much. I think it's impossible now, but I can understand the rationale. They could abort and try and find someone else, but if Roman is one of their big money guys right now, even if the money is not that good, it's better to have that than to lose that and try someone else out. Maybe it would be worth the risk? It's up to them to try it. If you feel like WWE hate you then seriously why would you keep watching? Why would I go to someone's house if every time I go he treats me like dirt? Like in NXT, when things are hot sometimes people in attendance will chant "better than RAW" as if they aren't all under the same umbrella, like fans are convinced that by supporting their third tier brand they're somehow striking against WWE itself, when like, isn't the fact that NXT exists as some sort of consolation for those who don't like Raw evidence that WWE doesn't hate the fans? I find this narrative that there's a fight between WWE and the fans a self fulfilling prophecy.
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saintpat
El Dandy
Release the hounds!!!
Posts: 7,664
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Post by saintpat on Apr 4, 2017 10:53:15 GMT -5
I can't be bothered to find the post to quote it but I am laughing out loud and the guy who said there are a few hundred people at most that post on Internet message boards. That's not what I said -- in any given week, there are several hundred or a few thousand who post. Millions watch on TV. More people go to WWE live events each week than post on message boards about the product. Do you really think the majority of WWE fans spend time on message boards (or FB or YouTube) commenting on it?
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Post by xCompackx on Apr 4, 2017 10:58:15 GMT -5
I can't be bothered to find the post to quote it but I am laughing out loud and the guy who said there are a few hundred people at most that post on Internet message boards. That's not what I said -- in any given week, there are several hundred or a few thousand who post. Millions watch on TV. More people go to WWE live events each week than post on message boards about the product. Do you really think the majority of WWE fans spend time on message boards (or FB or YouTube) commenting on it? I... don't think that's true at all. If we're counting every single possible way people could discuss wrestling (which would also include IRC, Skype, Discord, etc.), there's likely hundreds of thousands of fans who go somewhere to talk wrestling.
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