The Seventh Dimension 03.07.08: Pirates of the Buy-Rates!

Posted by T.G. Corke on 03.07.2008

In response to feedback I received last week, I try to examine what possible ramifications arise from the illegal allocation of pay-per-views on the internet. After that, I’ll look at how the companies themselves – WWE in particular – can use the demand for internet programme access to their advantage. Get inside, you mother-lover!



I want to make one thing clear from the start, regarding last week's article. I've been receiving a bit of backlash from people after I said, and I quote, "I still report pay-per-views getting uploaded" (onto Youtube). Well, I have an admission to make. Whether or not you believe me when I say this, that's ok. But I swear it's the case.

That was a typo.

What I meant to say was "I WOULD still report pay-per-views getting uploaded" – i.e. I think anyone reading should do it if they feel strongly enough. However, it was too late to change it once I'd already started receiving feedback and, not wanting to look like a lazy writer who forgot to proof-read this shit (as well as the simple fact that I shouldn't feel ashamed had it been the truth anyway), I just went along with it. But, truth be heard, I don't actually know HOW to report a video. It seems to have something to do with sending a letter to someone in America and, being from Britain, I'm not really up to that.

Make no mistake about it, though – the cost-free dispersal of pay-per-views onto a popular video-sharing website can have only an adverse affect on the industry. But, rather than spend this column criticising those who commit to this practice, I just want to outline what small effect it has.

Pirates of the Buy-Rates!

Straight away, what needs mentioning is that WWE obviously is in no financial crisis. It's a revenue machine, and the substantial loss it suffers from piracy is made back from merchandise and live-gate sales. There is no immediate danger of going bankrupt, and every reason to believe its stock will remain steady and continue to rise gradually. I also am one who doesn't see it as necessary, or even beneficial, to hold twelve pay-per-views a year – especially when the prices for these are increasing on what seems like a weekly basis and the matches are repeating more and more. So yes, I can certainly understand the temptation of watching these events for free just hours after they've taken place.

However, if you believe it's a victimless crime, you're only fooling yourself.

**At this point, I was planning to study at length a whole bunch of financial data straight from the horse's mouth, so I'd have a better idea of what I was about to discuss. However, it's really hard to find such stuff, and when I finally did chance upon something that might help me…damn, it was long. And boring. And it was in a pdf, which scrolls really slowly for me. So, screw it. I'll just go on what I've gathered from years of reading other peoples' monetary analysis in the past. Also, if I'm wrong on any of this? Then, I'm fucked, so please feel free to correct me. But only if you actually know.**

Ok, here goes. The wrestling companies that produce pay-per-views have to pay the channels hosting them a percentage cut from their sales of the show, as well as an upfront fee. This is different from their weekly shows, for which the company is paid by the networks. If the pay-per-view channel is affiliated with the network that broadcasts the weekly shows, there's probably some arrangement. But this gist is, if you hold a pay-per-view, you're going to have an amount of debt to pay back in return for getting it on television. Now, I have no idea how much this comes to, but I'm going to hazard a guess (and I do mean hazard) at around 5-10% of the moneys earned from the buys, and a yearly contract amounting to a couple of hundred grand. So, with the average buy-rate for one of these things (not including Wrestlemania) being perhaps just north of the 200,000 mark, and the average price (again, Wrestlemania excluded) at about $50 or so, WWE rakes in a highly respectable $10 million per event, but with over $1,000,000 now being deducted by the pay-per-view company. And that's not including all the cash spent actually staging the things from hiring the venues and creating the sets and whatnot, which is an insane amount. Luckily, gate-attendance also more than covers those costs.

So some of you will be thinking "well, if they're already assured of receiving a good amount of money, what does it matter if I see the show for free?" But guys, we're not talking about just one person seeing it for free. This isn't the same as copying a £10 CD for a friend, or recording a TV show for personal use. This is the widespread internet distribution of what is sometimes an $80 show. Looking at the figures for a regular episode of Raw, Smackdown, ECW, or even HEAT (!) which is uploaded on WWE's own website, the amount of hits is seldom fewer than 5,000 after two days of it being on Youtube. ‘StingerVI', the site's most notorious and popular WWE uploader, has well over 3,000 subscribers. While this makes very little difference to an individual television rating, it paints a much more important picture when applied to pay-per-view, which always tends to get a lot more viewers on there. Five-thousand people watching for free, which is about 5% of the amount of people who buy the events on average, will set WWE back over a quarter of a million dollars. And, as I mentioned, these numbers increase usually due to the PPV shows being so significant.

But why does this matter if the WWE has so much money? Well, because the workers suffer from it. The wrestlers have a set bottom-line salary that doesn't change, but they also receive cuts of merchandise and – yes – pay-per-view revenue from events that feature them prominently. The fewer people who are actually paying to see these events, the less money these guys earn for putting themselves through hell. And yeah, the top guys in the company (the ones who actually make the money) are already earning serious paper within, or in some cases surpassing, the six-figure mark. That doesn't change the fact that the system in place to aid them even further is raped when this happens and, whether it be a few hundred or a few thousand dollars, it's against the law and it's not very fair. Plus, a lot of that money is spent on traveling and hotel rooms, because they're not provided by the company itself. So, in the end, it does make a difference.

And, let's bear one other thing in mind here – one that can't really be ignored since it's mentioned so often during other debates. This is NOT wrestling's glory-period, anymore. This isn't the Attitude era, when fans had to be turned away because there weren't any seats left and a few missed transactions wouldn't be noticed for all the crisp notes the bookers were rolling around naked in and using for bog roll. We often forget that wrestling, for all the success WWE has had economically, is still a niche market. Wrestling today is often seen as on a bit of a decline, so it also seems mean that those who harp on about the days of gold-plated visual blowjobs from 2000 won't do anything to help the circumstances. Goodness only knows how much TNA and Ring of Honor are being swindled if the consequences on the WWE are so notable. It'll be pretty damn drastic, to say the least.

So, anyway, there's my take on the pay-per-view situation. Some of my logic may be flawed, but I can only assume I'm on the right track. Also, I'm not one of the God-fearing over-conservatives that want to sue anyone who downloads ‘Drop It Like It's Hot' on Limewire. Certainly not for a first offence, anyway. Not that you're likely to download the same Snoop Dogg track more than once, unless you live in some bizarre ‘Looney Toons'-ish utopia where some stupid nemesis keeps running into your room and deleting your files. In any case, it's worth remembering that everyone involved has to make their money in some way, just like you or me. There must be a reason for this price structure aside from "OMG VINCE IS SOOO MEAN, GRINCH-FACE A.S.L.!!!~!", because it's only going to be counter-productive for THEM in the long-run otherwise. And, when it boils down to it, you don't have to watch it. You can just leave it, until something more appealing comes along. Or wait for the DVD if, in hindsight, you wish you'd seen it.

And Now For Something Completely Similar…

Having spoken about the negative effects that Youtube and other file-sharing programs have on the wrestling industry when utilised unethically, I want to consider how they could be used in the right way. Because, in fairness, WWE brings a lot of this on itself.

WWE's official Youtube channel is pretty poor. Nothing suggest that they're really serious about using the internet to their advantage with this. There are a few clips, but none of them are any more than a few seconds and they're all just vignettes ripped from the shows such as hype videos for Floyd Mayweather and Ric Flair's Hall of Fame induction. Even the layout sucks quite a horrific caliber of shit. It's ugly as all hell, and looks more like someone just searched ‘HTML' on Ask Jeeves and picked the first code he saw rather than made any attempt to reflect the product in any way. Which is odd, since Youtube doesn't require you to enter HTML.

But, that's beside the point. My point is, for everything TNA does wrong or questionably, one thing they DO know about is how to exploit Youtube. An exclusive, regular show that actually comes across as worthy of watching. This philosophy just makes so much more sense than running around throwing fits because somebody else managed to upload five excruciating seconds of a Raw House Show captured on a Motorola CUN7 or whatever. It's counter-productive because it means fewer people, potentially ones who aren't fans yet, have the chance of seeing your product, and it also just pisses off and alienates those who went to your shows and wanted to share their moments.

So what am I suggesting should happen? Well, going back to pay-per-views again, it's obvious that a lot of the angst comes from having to pay such a lot of money for a show that the viewer is not going to enjoy on the whole. So, here's a suggestion, similar to their current 24/7 service – Start selling individual matches after the pay-per-view has been broadcast. That way, those who want to see something in particular still can, but without having to sit through two hours or so of stuff that they're not interested in. I guess the problem with that is that nobody wants to pay just to see some throwaway match or the Divas pillow-fight garbage, but then maybe you shouldn't be putting that kind of fuck-awful bilge on pay-per-view in the first place. Besides, you don't have to even TRY to sell that sort of stuff on its own, as it can be considered part of the ‘package' and nothing more. Honestly, start selling the matches as stand-alone shows a few days after the pay-per-views, going up in price depending on how important the match is or its want. That way, nobody has to pay for anything they don't want to see, and the company will actually make more money because each match sold on its own will be worth more than its value as part of the whole show. It's win/win.

Another thing that should happen is that Raw and Smackdown should be available, at least in some form, online. I say this because, as an ‘international' viewer who doesn't own satellite or cable, it's nigh-on impossible for me to watch any of the shows without giving into the lure of Youtube. And, as I mentioned earlier, a few thousand people choosing to watch online rather than on television really doesn't alter ratings, just buy-rates. So it's in WWE's best interests to cater to as big an audience as possible. Besides, if they hosted the shows on WWE.com as opposed to Youtube, they could probably find a way of merging the ratings from the site with the network ratings and come out looking stronger. Hell, why not? ITV has a live video feed on the internet (when it actually works), so there are visibly benefits to the idea. If nothing else, it removes the necessity some people feel to illegally view the shows online, and it would get the WWE website more hits, so it's at least worth considering.


Youtube today is to television what MP3 downloads are to CDs. I find myself watching less and less television, partly because I get very little reception, but also because of the convenience of knowing that someone will end up posting my favourite programs (sans adverts) online within a matter of days. The music industry realised the power of downloads, and ended up combining the accumulated sales of MP3s and the sales of CD singles for the UK singles charts. How long will it be before both the compact disc AND television become obsolete thanks to the wonders of the internet? Time will tell, and perhaps it will never happen. All I know is, piracy is a crime for a reason. And while there are many laws that don't make much sense, one such as this where the repercussions could be so damaging to businesses has to be at least respected.

Besides, if you're only watching so you can whine about it afterwards, nobody's profiting. :oP

Wrestlelife

The Matter: Not really much to discuss from my personal life. Just that a couple of friends have gone away traveling for five months, which obviously saddens me slightly but hopefully they'll enjoy it. Another two are going at the beginning of April, and most of these people will go to University later this year too. I'm going to miss these people. That is all.

The Link: Miss Kitty. Missy Hyatt. Mister Kennedy. Mike Mizanin (sort of). All of these people have the syllable ‘miss' in their names. I'm sure there are other obvious ones I've missed (yes, pun intended), but these will do. Plus, ‘Jim Ross' can easily be rearranged to say ‘miss'. Yay!

Oooh, yeah!

That's the end of that, then! Thanks as usual for reading, and here's hoping for another nice tragedy-free week in the world of predetermined homoerotic grappling contests.

Ear cataracts?!?

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