Familiarity does breed contempt but the major problem is that the more widely available a beer becomes the more places there are that don't look after it or it becomes a "token real ale". I've never gone for Pride much but after being cornered into having a GK IPA a few years ago I found it darker than I remembered and devoid of flavour.
The explosion of microbreweries in the last 10 years has made the availability of decent pints much wider but there is also a much larger mountain of dross.