IIRC NFLN started when having your own media property was the cool thing to do. It also helped NFL get the "party line" out in front of the fans. I think they have other ways to do that now, and the cost/benefit ratio is way below 1.0 these days.
It is just kinda sad that they are fabulously wealthy yet penny-pinching at the same time. I think sooner or later their continued watering down of the product is gonna catch up with them. In our case as Pats fans, it's clearly not the same kind of enjoyment these days as it once was, so it seems we should not be the benchmark, but still, here we are.
I still make time for the NFL, but no where near as much as I used to. I used to watch three games start to finish on Sundays, even more if you consider I had a fourth game queued up on the DVR and if it was good I'd squeeze that in too. Last season I was down to one and a half games. This season it often is one or less, maybe catch the 20 minute ad-free (for u2b premium) highlights that NFL puts on u2b twelve hours after the game if I want more content. I bet they shut that down sooner or later too.
In addition to the fact as Pats fans the product has been miserable, IMO the NFL product itself is just so loaded with ads it's terrible. I didn't realize how good we had it when Summerall and Madden read the "Murder, She Wrote" ad copy. And they just can't seem to fix the terrible game-time officials. Why watch a game if the zebras determine the outcome so damn often? As far as I'm concerned, get every damn official off the field and do it all with video.