Hmm so you still need to login suring the time of the event? Not very useful for people like me whom have had a year off and would love to relive the last years events.
You can buy events you missed (using ingame or real-world currency). Also, they aren't promising that the previous season's contents will be available for the story journal. This seems mainly like something they're doing going forward to address complaints from folks who couldn't keep up with the schedule.