You are right it was citi owned before the changes. The changes was when they went for having DC as it's own club to branding it as a master card. The one nice thing was that it was good at a lot more places since even fewer merchants took DC than Am Ex in the US, but the benefits declined dramatically. You used to get 1 WN credit for even $1,000 spent and they increased it to $1,500. They also stopped allowing points to be used for Northwest miles and a few other changes that didn't justify to keep the card for it's annual fee.