A lot of people blame the internet for things, and the "smarks." Internet fans are also supposed to be a minority, so you have two interesting concepts: 1. We ruin wrestling, and 2. We're too small to make a difference.
Anyway, a lot of net fans don't care about backsatge crap to the extent we're supposed to. Look at all the guys who think JBL is great, even though his antics backstage have been HORRIBLE. Hell, I'm even cheering for Holly right now, because MNM's entrance is a "snooze" button for me.
I'd say what makes wrestling less entertaining is less that I stopped being a "mark," and more that the WWF changed what a "mark" was. Like opening Pandora's box, they changed the face of wrestling with the likes of Hart, and more technical oriented wrestling. They took us backstage, they even have a web presence.
You know how certain dogs are never the same once they taste raw meat? We've tasted the meat, we damn well liked it, and we're not the same. I think this is true for both "smarks" and "marks," not just one category or the other. Mostly because I DO believe that "internet fans" aren't a big enough category to make a difference, but ratings go down due to casual fans and marks losing interest, and go up (and draw responses) from good programming. The WWE (and WCW, ECW) raised the bar. Now they're unable to reach it. That's the reason I'm not enjoying it as much. I don't think I was a mark (In the strictest sense) even during the attitude era, when HHH still got respect on the net and most of the main eventers still put on good matches. I don't think most people on the net were marks either, but I think it falls into an area of loose semantics.