FriendofWalt.com

Blue Sky Disney, one of the blogs with a lot of inside intel on upcoming Disney stuff, is predicting major changes in Orlando– especially at MGM (soon to be known as Disney-Pixar!) Also, some interesting doings and the slim possibility of something known as Beastly Kingdom (an area of Animal Kingdom that will explore mythological creatures like unicorns, chimeras, dragons, etc)

Read all the juicy Disney tidbits, and possible red herrings at

http://blueskydisney.blogspot.com/

There’s a great article about the use of skylights at Disney (
http://passport2dreams.blogspot.com/2007/05/verticality.html)

His argument is that the vertical spaces at Disney were the hardest to design, and that there are false skylights all over Disney in the imagineers quest to control the environment. It’s hard to argue with his photographs and his well-reasoned analysis.

The only disappointing thing about this is that now I have to go back and read his entire blog to see what other gems I’m missing! And I’m already behind in my movie-going (haven’t seen Spiderman, or Pirates for that matter), my television watching, and my book-reading (not to forget my other Blogs-reading)

And let’s not forget that he’s got a great list of other Disney blogs for me to check out.

It’s going to be a LONG weekend!

Way back in college, our marketing professor told us about the epiphany that Xerox had one day– the day they decided they were in the Information business, and not the copier business. That small epiphany led them to a whole new level of business, and gave them an entry into well… what is now the 21st century. In some ways, it’s what stopped them from being Olivetti (the once ubiquitous typewriter that is now oh so quaint)

In a recent article in the Orlando papers (READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE.) about a shakeup at Disney Imagineering (for those of you who don’t know, Imagineers are the guys at Disney that do all of the thinking work) One of the corporate types is quoted as saying, “We are in the immersive experience business; it’s no longer the parks and resorts business.” She also promises that Disney will create more “immersive experiences”-

I like this as a redefinition of Disney as a whole– except that I would say they are in the Experiences Business. They provide experiences for people. Sometimes they can be a little too prepackaged, or not without adventure and excitement (that’s often the complaint about Disney-fying Times Square– they put their squeaky clean all over a place that is more exciting when it’s dirty)

Anyway, I thought this was worth mentioning. Immersive Experience.

According to our friends over at the Disney Blog, Fort Wilderness, which has been closed to the public, will become part of the memorabilia. It’s being torn down to make way for something that will be open to the public, and hopefully not too new-fangled.

It’s a hard rope to walk on (the difference between being nostalgic and being fixated on the past) It’s even harder when you are a large corporate entity, and have shareholders demanding maximum utilization of assets.

I’m pretty sure this is all for the best, but am still a little sad for it.

There’s a great picture of Walt and somebody’s Grandfather planning out Fort Wilderness on the Disney Blog link above.