walker art and the web

When the Walker Art Centre decided to host the shock of the view, net artists came out of the woods and tried to decipher the meaning of net art/web art and the discussion was heated and interesting.
Fast forward a few years and the Walker let Stev Deitz go, and closed their web art portal for new expression.
What led to the dismissal of web art by institutions?
I'm not buying conspiracy theories but was it about funding and distribution?
The question still lingers, although for the most part, net art graduated without the Walker's endorsement.
Today Rhizome, Furtherfield and numerous artist run enities offer new media comissions, art exhibits and even the Pace has digital art gallery (at least the commercial kids get it).
Where is Walker now? Where are most of the brick and mortar art institues on the web. I can pick on the Walker vbecause it has/had a profile to maintain.
Institutions may blog, they may advertise, but they seem to have missed the point in just about every area of distributed art.
Now net art exists healthy and alive without institutional support.
Where there is institutional support, the works are generally considered second rate by the net art community.
Is it time to attempt a re-embrace, or should we just come to the conclusion that physical venues are dedicated to physical works and virtual venues will always eschew anything that isn't dedicated to being web/net centric?
We see hybrids at many institutionla venues, as if it's OK to be partly virtual/ partly physical.
I still return to the Walker however. The decision they made, nearly 6 years ago seems more political than practical at this juncture.
Did they envision an art going populace that accepted web based works as being more accessible than physical installations?
Currently, art students base their decisions for distribution on money and exposure, knowing full well that a good u-tube will do more for their career than a physical show at the local state run agency.
Good time to be a young artist, great time for diverting the funding to where the current populace looks.
Cold here tonite, snow and wind blowing.
Eric