All Things Disney

How Walt Disney Pictures helped start a tech giant

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 19:13:00 +0000

Walt and the many of the smart folks that worked with him were great tinkerers and inventors. You know all the history behind the Multiplane Camera, the Omnimover, and any other number of fantastic inventions. What you may not know (I certainly didn’t) is that Walt Disney’s little film company had an indirect hand in starting one of the monsters (in size anyhow) of modern technology.

It turns out that when Walt’s engineers were building Fantasound they did not have an effective way to test and tune it. No surprise really, since nobody had really done 8 track recordings of this type before. What they needed was an audio oscillator.

An audio oscillator is a test device that allows the operator/technician to set a frequency and an associated output level. The device puts out a constant tone at the frequency set, which allows the technician to observe how well the system it’s plugged into works. All sorts of other ‘listening’ devices can be placed on the other end of the system to measure things like distortion, amplification, etc. These devices are very handy, but as you can note in the YouTube link above, they can also be very dangerous when used incorrectly resulting in damage to hearing and even property.

I think you can imagine how effective that would be in helping engineers and technicians working on Fantasound make sure the system worked as intended… to reproduce Leopold Stokowski’s soundtrack as precisely as possible. So where did the Disney Company get such a device in the late 1930’s?

It turns out, a young guy by the name of Bill Hewlett, an electrical engineer, was working on his graduate thesis at Stanford. He had come up with a way to make a better and cheaper audio oscillator using a 3 watt incandescent light bulb. That invention lead to the first product ever built by a little company in a garage in Palo Alto now know the world over a Hewlett Packard. That little company sold 8 of the HP200B audio oscillators to Walt Disney Studios in 1939 for use on Fantasound.

In 1999 HP split the company and formed Agilent. Agilent took over the test and measurement systems that had defined the young HP and that of courses traces its roots all the way back to that garage, $500 bucks and two friends. In a twist of fate, WWII would go on the cement HP as one of the greatest technology companies with massive growth throughout the 40’s and 50’s. The same war, along with the nasty strike that crippled the company in the early 40’s, would almost destroy the Walt Disney Studios as markets dried up and Walt and Roy struggled to keep the company afloat.

You can read more about the HP 200 audio oscillator here, here and here.

Talent Everywhere

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 03:10:00 +0000

Many folks are in a hurry to come and pack as much ‘park’ into their vacation as they can when they come to WDW. That’s a shame, because you find talented people and performers everywhere if you take the chance to look.

Here are a couple of our favorites that I suggest you check out the next time your in Florida.

The first is Yehaabob Jackson. Bob has been the regular bar piano player at Port Orleans Riverside since 1997 (back when it was called Dixie Landings). He puts on a heck of a show and here is just one link to YouTube showing how much so:

The second are the two performing acts over at the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa. The first is the lobby pianist:

And the other is the Grand Floridian Society Orchestra that plays from the upstairs balcony in front of one of the better hidden and nicer bars around as well. A great place for a casual date or to meet friends and hang out.

So take some time out to rest, relax and enjoy all of the other entertainment options at your disposal when you’re here.

School starts and crowds wane…

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 19:25:00 +0000

It’s still HOT here in central Florida… very hot indeed. We’ve been here permanently about a month now, and while it’s hot having lived in South Carolina before here helped get us acquainted to what long hot summers can be.

Most of the month the lines have been pretty long, August still being a pretty busy month around the World. The usual mix of people trying to squeeze in a late summer vacation before school starts along with a wide array of foreign friends (many Europeans spend more than a couple weeks in America for their holidays) makes the whole area both interesting and sometimes frustrating. Long lines and high heat make for a strange mix of emotions in both young and old. This time of year also brings a lot of pop up thunderstorms and spotty rain. Disney puts on some of the best fireworks around, but Mother Nature routinely steps in with these fantastic lightening shows to remind who owns the sky.

Now that schools are starting back in session, the line lengths around the parks seem to slip by the day. Thursday night in Epcot it was quite busy. Friday we took off and just bummed around Animal Kingdom Lodge for views of the animals and to have some Zebra Cakes. Yesterday we spent much of the morning at Animal Kingdom, where the lines were generally short in the morning (we walked on the flying dinosaur ride twice in a row much to the delight of our 3 year old, and I rode Exp. Everest in single rider twice in about 15 minutes or so).

Today’s morning was spent in the Magic Kingdom starting off just about 5 minutes or so after rope drop (we’d have been there early had it not been for Daddy’s stop at Starbucks). The crowds were almost non-existent. I stopped to get my hair cut at the Main Street Barbershop (thanks to Michal, Rex and Norma for the usual great service, and the fun of watching more than a few get their hair cut for the first time) while Mommy and munchkin went off to ride Dumbo, Peter Pan, the Merry-Go-Round and a couple of potty stops all in the first hour with little to no line. By about lunch time lines had started to build slightly, but when we left at about 1 o’clock they hadn’t even filled the first section of the parking lot, if you can believe that.

It’s interesting to watch regions of the country (and the world for that matter) cycle in and out of the area as schools start or life picks up and returns to some more structured routine. As I mentioned earlier, a few weeks back in was a virtual potpourri of ethnicity, citizenship and regions. This weekend has been noticeably slanted towards the New England region (New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York City) where school appears to not routinely start until around the 1st of September or even after Labor Day. Or maybe you folks up there are just used to taking your vacations later than all the rest?

Living here so far hasn’t changed our view of the parks, but it has allowed us to slow down and do more what we call random sampling. You don’t feel rushed to see things and make time to stop and see little things or listen to other shows you might otherwise have skipped.

For instance, today we stopped and listened to the brass section from the Disney World Band play in Liberty Square along with accompanying percussion. They played some Dixie Land jazz and some patriotic numbers, including ‘When We’re Human’ from ‘The Princess and the Frog’. Many people hurried by, taking pictures on the fly or avoiding the area entirely. We had time to stand in the shade, let the little one dance and wave a flag given out by the guy who is probably the first chair trumpet player, and enjoy the fact that life, for a moment, was not in a hurry to get to the next FastPass line.

Back from the Dead… Well Not Really Dead…

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 19:18:00 +0000

So it’s been a little longer road back to blogging than I thought I would be. As usual, there is a good reason for that, and ‘real’ life sometimes gets in the way.

The good news is we’ve moved! To Orlando, FL! Yep, we now live a cozy 15 minutes from All Things Diz in Central Florida. My job prospects with The Walt Disney Company have never quit come to fruition (with no lack of trying on my part, I assure you). It just became time to consider other alternatives.

Sometimes God (or whatever supreme being you believe in) tells you it’s time to make a change. That tell of course can be interpreted in multiple ways and sometimes you get a little too narrowly focused in where your looking. Thankfully for me, I was able to open the aperture of my job search a little bit and do so fairly quickly; and it paid off much quicker too.

Disney is a good company to work for, I have no doubt. But like the overall economy right now, it’s a bit bi-polar when it comes to the needs of the business as far as hiring goes. We’ll keep a long term eye out across the way, and hopefully I’ll have more stuff to cover now as time goes on since we are right here. I’m looking forward to it.

In the mean time, I have a great new job and with a solid, long term company and I’m happy to be employed and living as neighbors to our friends!

More to come!

Real TRON Light Cycle for sale

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 21:41:00 +0000

All I can say is WOW, COOL and I so want one!

For sale via E-Bay with thanks to Giz.

Streaming Disney through Pandora

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:24:00 +0000

Looking for that music soundtrack to your Disney life but don’t want to invest a fortune in CDs, streaming equipment, etc.?

I’ve been a long time fan of Mike Newell’s (of WDW Today fame) excellent MouseWorld Radio channels. This idea/point won’t nearly replace Mike’s self described hours of ‘sitting in a bush with a microphone’ for pure park music ambiance…

But if you’re a fan of Disney related music, you can make a channel at Pandora and get all your Disney favorites from movies to Broadway streamed to your favorite device. My channel that seems to be working well so far is a channel based on the selection ‘Walt Disney's The Lion King (Children's) Radio’.

So far so good… and since Panasonic (among others) just added Pandora support to their Blu-Ray player line and you can now get Pandora on your iPhone 4.0 and/or Android device, you can have Disney music with you just about wherever you go.

Disney and console games

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 02:29:00 +0000

Despite recent layoffs and closings at some of Disney’s gaming studios, Disney still continues its string of big console game titles with 2 announcements at E3.

The first is for the Nintendo Wii platform with today’s announcements and sneak peaks of the upcoming ‘Epic Mickey’ title. Below are two of the many YouTube clips showing the trailer and a light ‘behind the scenes’ title.

The second is a look at the next installment in the ‘Kingdom Hearts’ series for the Play Station Portable from Square Enix.

It’s interesting where the whole gaming front for Disney is going on consoles in general I think. The 2 titles today both run on platforms with a generally accepted perception of being family oriented (Wii) and/or tween/teen oriented (PSP), vice any games for the more ‘mature’ XBOX 360 or PlayStation 3. That continues to be the case from both the previous Kingdom Hearts titles as well as other more casual games like Midway Mania on the Wii.

That said, both of these games are much ‘darker’ (or maybe more edgy?) than I’d traditionally expect from someone like Disney or something one would play in a more family environment. If being edgy and slightly dark like this is what it takes to suck in the tween boy demographic, is it any wonder that Disney struggles with keeping them engaged in the parks and other offerings? It’s a VERY tough nut to crack.

The Steve Jobs effect

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 00:39:00 +0000

Late last week the Wall Street Jounal’s AllThingsD D8 conference posted the entire Steve jobs interview they did with the Apple CEO. You might recall I noted some excerpts from this conference in my blog post titled ‘Disney, the iPad and Consumption’.

In particular I shared my thoughts on Jeffrey Katzenberg’s interview and the realization that NONE of the Dreamworks Animation ‘content’ can be had online, ANYWHERE, in ANY FORM. A HUGE contrast to the Disney companies recent, and relentless, push into the technological 21st century. And a huge contract to Apple’s current ‘consumption’ based product line (iPod’s, iPads, and iTunes stores galore).

You can see Disney’s push into media all over the place in it’s media properties. The most recent example being ‘Alice in Wonderland’ which opened on 10ish weeks ago (March 5th or so) and is, some what controversially, now already available at Redbox, DirectTV On Demand, Target (and other big box and online retailers) and of course all the Apple favorites as well.

So the interesting quote from Steve is down in the Q&A session where he notes that someday soon you’ll be able to pay a lot of money to watch a first run movie at home while it is still IN the theater. I wonder if Bob Iger and Disney will be the first to touch off that debate as well?

Verizon Wireless hosts Disney Competition

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 22:16:00 +0000

Are you a Verizon Wireless customer that’s chomping at the bit to run off to California and see the new water extravaganza World of Color?

Well one lucky person like that might just be in luck (and one other if they are the runner up, but you gotta schlep there yourself). If you register for the new My Verizon web portal for your service you’ll be entered in a competition to win a VIP Getaway package:

One (1) Grand Prize Winner: Family of up to four
September 10, 2010 - September 12, 2010

2 Nights and 3 Days Stay at one of the Disneyland® Resort Hotels (Friday, Saturday & Sunday)
3-Day Disneyland® Resort Park Hopper® Tickets (Disneyland® Park and Disney's California Adventure® Park)
Private Party Passes to the Verizon "Disney World of Color" at Disney's California Adventure® Park. Airfare & Transportation provided (Must be more than 250 miles from Anaheim, CA)
1 Samsung Reality Smartphone with a $75 Verizon Wireless Gift Card

One (1) Runner Up Winner:

Family 4 pack of Disneyland® Resort Park Hopper® Tickets
4 Verizon "Disney World of Color" Private Party Passes for event September 10, 2010 (No Transportation Provided)

Event Details Include

Private event shared between Verizon & Coca Cola (6000 invites)
VIP Viewing of the World of Color Attraction
After Hours private party at Paradise Pier
Disney Characters in attendance
Rides: Screaming Over California, Toy Story Mania, King Tritons Carousel, Mickey Fun Wheel, Midway Games and the Silly Symphony Swings
Photographers on-hand to capture the evening
Food and Beverages provided
Gifts

Got to http://www.verizoncolorconnection.com/ to check it out.

Disney, the iPad and Consumption

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 22:38:00 +0000

A few days ago Dan Warne, an Australian tech journalist and writer for apcmag.com, posted an article at the later site with nice pictures about the upcoming ABC iPad app. It looks pretty snazzy!

The article has some nice discussion and some very nice pictures of the app in action on an iPad. It also has some interesting comments that I think show just how closely Apple and The Walt Disney Company have become, with Mobile Producer Manuela Davidson being noted as saying she:

‘… told us ABC had been planning its iPad app before Steve Jobs even announced the iPad, because it seemed such a sure thing that Apple was going to release a tablet-sized "iDevice", and it was clear this would be a great way to provide ABC content to people.’

More like: ‘we knew about this in advance, so we started on it right away’. They weren’t fast enough to be a launch partner, but that’s probably because the upgrades required in the backend to take advantage of the higher resolution needed time to be brought online.

I was thinking about this article in the back of my mind today because Jeffrey Katzenberg was apparently all about his iPad today at the All Things Digital D8 conference, an annual tech event hosted by the Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg and Kara Fisher. What’s REALLY interesting to note is you can consume what feels like a million Disney related properties on iTunes (and therefore the iPad and iPhone), but not ONE Dreamworks Animation movie… You can buy or rent a very LARGE chunk of Disney’s movies and TV properties through iTunes, and here soon stream most of the current TV content using the iPad app (one already exists for the iPhone).

Mr. Katzenberg talks about how large movie libraries are becoming less and less valuable because of a ‘systematic change’ in content consumption. We’ve heard a similar tale from Bob Iger and team as well, as DVD sales have continued to slide from their peek as people shift their consumption habits. The question is of course how much does seemingly ubiquitous access to content offset that apparent decline in value? Media is only ‘worth’ something when somebody will pay to see it after all.

The iPad is a bit of a tech classification football right now in that it doesn’t fit neatly into any current category easily (too big for a pocket/smart device, too limited to be a netbook or a laptop competitor). However, in its current incarnation I’m tending to agree with Paul Thurrott’s recent assessment more and more (though maybe not in as strong a terms) that at the end of the day the iPad is really a consumption device with some added light productivity functions. That became even more apparent to me today when James Kendrick of mobile tech site jkOnTheRun admitted in a blog post that he has a ‘consumption’ addiction; that of buying iPad apps!

The iPod, iPhone and the whole iTuned ecosystem has, at its base level, always been about providing the best end-to-end tech experience for consumption. Bob Iger seems to agree, as does Jeffrey, only one seems to be really doing something about it at the moment however.

See Disney Dream under construction

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 25 May 2010 21:25:00 +0000

Meyer Werft, the company building the next two Disney Cruise Ships hosts a webcam on their from inside two of their buildings. Right now you can see the Disney Dream under construction by clicking on this link. Pics are updated weekly.

Enjoy!

Disney infrastructure upgrade….

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 24 May 2010 03:15:00 +0000

As most of you know if you’ve followed my little site for a while, I’ve been looking long term to shift to a Disney career when the time is right and the opportunity presents itself.

I’ve come close at least once (they really wanted someone in California vice Florida though), and the guy I would have worked for almost died coming out to interview me because he suffered a post-flight pulmonary embolism upon arrival in Florida! Thank god he’s alright AND there is a hospital in Celebration.

I also had an unfortunate phone call with a VP in Imagineering that I wasn’t prepared for (shame on me). Though I got a couple of nice letters and an e-mail or two from Marty Sklar before he retired. Since then I think Imagineering has had maybe 4 job announcements and at least one of those was looking for someone who was a specialist in concrete! They had one other opening I DID apply for last month for a project financial manager, but it has since closed and you can’t even see it on the website anymore. Hoping it’s still in the grinding machine, cause I haven’t gotten a formal rejection yet.

I’ve also got more rejection e-mails than I can count these days (probably close to 75 at the moment). Heh. Thought those have slowed considerably along with the amount of hiring Disney has been doing. Opportunities are still there; just tougher to come by, and probably harder yet if you’re not already in Central Florida someplace (like I’m not at the moment).

All that’s to say that I try to keep a pretty close eye on announcements in Florida. Most of the announcements are hard to see anything through other than just what they state. But every now and then you can get a whiff at bigger things a foot.

Two recent announcements from both Corporate IT and Walt Disney Parks and Resorts leads me to believe that a major infrastructure update/upgrade is in the works to replace or at least augment the current storage environments that are used across the Disney IT enterprise.

So if you’re looking for Disney employment and know some serious stuff about enterprise storage management, check out announcements 246400 Senior Specialist, Storage Governance Technical or 246391 Infrastructure Change Coordinator.

Back in action…

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 07 May 2010 02:41:00 +0000

Alright, so I’ve taken a few months off to clean up some other stuff and just generally take a brief break from blogging. That allowed me time to play way too much World of Warcraft, but that’s a much different story.

Posts will probably come a little slower at first as I get my thoughts back in order about this and that.

So as a quick kick off, here is something you might or might not have known: Disney cast members have their own credit union.

It’s had various names of the years since it started in 1960, but today it’s know as Partners! Federal Credit Union and has over 100,000 current and former cast members and their relatives as members. They have a pretty decent footprint to server their members as well. In Florida alone they have 5 branches and 25 ATM’s.

The interesting thing about the ATM machines is that 3 of them are in apartment complexes where presumably many cast members live. Talk about serving you customer!

Bob Iger and the Publishing Industry?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 03:22:00 +0000

I read with interest the announcement earlier this week that Condé Nast, Hearst, Meredith, News Corporation and Time Inc. jointly announced an independent venture to develop open standards for a new digital storefront and related technology that will allow consumers to enjoy their favorite media content on portable digital devices. That story made me think almost immediately of the ideas of consumer consumption habits of media that Bob Iger has been talking about lately, the most recent being the discussion of the technology called ‘keychest’.

What made me think of Disney? Probably the quote statement in the press release:

“For the consumer, this digital initiative will provide access to an extraordinary selection of engaging content products, all customized for easy download on the device of their choice, including smartphones, e-readers and laptops,” explained John Squires, the venture’s interim managing director. “Once purchased, this content will be ‘unlocked’ for consumers to enjoy anywhere, anytime, on any platform.”

And here is how The Financial Times described Keychest:

Next month Disney plans to unveil Keychest, a new technology that will allow digital copies of films to be stored remotely and then viewed and moved across platforms, such as smartphones, or games consoles such as Microsoft's Xbox.

I’m not suggesting that they are in collusion in any way of course, just that in many ways two very different forms of media (print and movie entertainment) are converging to a very similar set of realizations it seems.

In the print case people are increasingly turning to digital media vice that traditional printed versions and socking it too newspaper and print magazines left and right. In the movie case people are ‘waiting for it on video’ and then in many cases are weary to forklift upgrade video collections from ‘good enough’ DVD to hi-rez formats like Blu-Ray (after all, how many portable devices can output Blu-Ray quality pics? Certainly nothing that the fruit company makes, among many many others).

It’s the whole CD to MP3 collection fatigue all over again. I switched to AAC because it had better quality than MP3 for the same file size, but even after over half of a decade of Apple dominance, the number of portable playback devices that work with AAC despite very competitive licensing rates can be counted on your fingers. I’m stuck, and it stinks.

And people, as Bob Iger has noted, think it stinks when they have to pay to watch a movie they bought on every device they own that’s different. And so you know what they do? Nothing. They buy the DVD, and they do nothing frankly beyond that in general. Us tech savy guys can buy software to rip it and remove the copy protection for a variety of devices (legally I might add), but my Dad nor my in-laws are interested in the least.

So it will be interesting to see if anybody else in the movie industry signs on to a deal like the publishing guys just did. It probably won’t be Keychest (I view that as more of a downpayment on Bob’s ideas that a technology they truly believe will be the standard at this point). but change is coming…

Lengthy Interview with Roy E. Disney

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:02:00 +0000

Didier Ghez pointed over at his Disney History blog today to a very lengthy (and high quality) interview with Roy E. Disney, son of Roy O. and nephew of Walt. The link from his blog takes you to the Archive of American Television, which has a very nice layout with background information, a 6 part taped interview along with notes and an outline.

The actual videos themselves are on YouTube in HD and all 6 parts run about 3 hours and 45 minutes. The AAT website says, ‘The interview was conducted by Jennifer Howard on November 5, 2007’.

I recommend you check out the AAT website, but here are the videos if you want to watch them back to back without a lot of fuss. :)

Sorry for the right edge bleedover, but I didn’t want to mess with the aspect ratio. You can actually see these on the YouTube website in HD directly.

Mickey in Florida still lagging on booking window?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 22:21:00 +0000

Of course it’s no surprise that Disney’s theme park’s continue to under-perform due to the economy. What I didn’t expect was that they’d be sending out incentives for what is normally their busiest week of the year: Christmas to New Years.

Back in the 80’s when it was just the Magic Kingdom and EPCOT, that week was dead. We used to go all of the time and the parks were pretty quiet. As long as you were out by the 31st, which was when central Florida college bowls games kicked in, you were golden. Now it’s the busiest time of the year; garnering holiday room rates, higher meal prices via surcharges, and a variety of extra money making deals for Mickey and crew.

But it looks like that won’t be the case this year. Mickey is sending out offers this late 30% off at select Deluxe hotels. I’m sure that the value and moderates are probably packed to the gills however. I’ve seen quiet a few offers this year for the Deluxe resorts, which isn’t a large surprise. It does make me wonder how all of the other luxury offerings that are doing up around WDW are doing?

The other downside of course is that people who spend $300+ a night for a hotel tend to spend MORE money both in the hotel and in the parks, whereas people in moderates and values probably tend to spend less. That’s not looking good for increasing those ‘per cap’ park and room spending numbers that were off 10% and 7% respectively.

Regardless of room occupancy and deals, given our experience at the last holiday week we went we won’t be going back this year for it either.

Here is the offer I got in my inbox earlier this week:

Last-Minute Magic!

Get 30% off Disney Deluxe Resorts for stays most nights Dec. 25, 2009 through Jan. 2, 2010.

Imagine spending one of the most festive weeks of the year in grand style at a Disney Deluxe Resort—at 30% off!
Make this holiday season your family's most magical ever. Call now, the number of rooms available at this special rate is limited.

Minimum length-of-stay requirements may apply for Friday or Saturday arrivals. Savings based on non-discounted price for the same room. Additional per-adult charges apply if more than two adults per room. No group rates or other discounts apply. Offer is nontransferable.

Call 407 939-5696 or your Travel Agent today!
Be sure to mention your PIN: XXXXX XXXXX XXXX
Ask about other Disney Resort categories that may be available when you call!

End of Year Telcon for Disney

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 17:35:00 +0000

Sorry it’s been a bit since I posted anything. No, I’m not dead. LoL. Just been very busy (and a little TOO addicted lately to this).

So here is the blow by blow of this quarter’s conference call.

Of course, the lead off story was about the early morning announcement of the unusual swap of Tom Staggs and Jay Rasulo. (Ed: It’s also possibly a shrewd move on Bob Iger’s part to keep two high profile executives inside the Disney fold, since with the slowly improving economy either would be natural targets to lure away. It also gives both of them a chance to broaden their base for a CEO shot sometime in the future).

Bob Iger opening comments:

Chinese last week gave permission for park in Shanghai. Looking forward to building a ‘world class resort’ experience.
Working toward closing of Marvel deal.
Studio had a BAD year due to performance of live action slate (Ed: 5 quarters of losses, which is probably the main reason why they let Dick Cook go). Also see challenges to overall motion picture model. Expect a tighter focus on costs of production, marketing and distribution. Expect more challenges from Disney to the status quo as the distribution mediums for content expand.
See Disney, PIXAR and Marvel now as covering a wider array of family entertainment.
Will continue to invest in franchise properties in each of these studios such as Princess and The Frog, Cars 2, and Pirates 4.
Parks and Resorts continues to expand at DCA, HK Disneyland, Cruise Line, etc.
ABC off to a good start with the fall lineup.
ABC Family continues to grow and gain viewership.
Disney Channel at all time high in ratings, and XD channel has been very successful in US. Overseas expansion also continues to drive Disney Channel subscriptions.
ESPN, in its 30th year, posted its largest ever audience numbers in the 4th quarter.

Tom Staggs financial highlights:

ESPN operating income up, much of it because of an extra week in the quarter and a 1 time recognition of additional deferred revenue.
ESPN add sales were flat, but because of the extra week were likely down about 3%.
Broadcasting improved on higher sale of shows, but relied on the extra week to overcome weaker ratings demands.
Q4 add revenue, excluding extra week, at affiliates was off about 15% but seems to be firming.
Q1 upfront pricing for advertising is running higher and Q2 option pickups are the highest in 10 years.
Studio had another bad quarter forcing movie right downs as well as some losses in the music side.
2010 studio slate is full however.
Consumer Products had a 20% decline in licensing due to the lag in how long it takes a downturn in the economy to ripple through the production of licensed products.
Parks and Resorts domestic attendance were up 10% due to extra week and solid response to promotional offers.
Combined attendance without the extra week was up about 3% with a 15% increase at DL offsetting a 3% decline at WDW.
WDW occupancy for the quarter was 84%, 5% under the prior year, Disneyland was also at 84% occupancy (4% lower).
Per cap spending at parks off 10% and per room spending was off 7%.
Q1 bookings are running about 5% behind last year.
New offers have increased the booking rate in recent weeks.
Pension and health care expenses will increase dramatically this year.
Strong cash flow and tight control on cash expenses have allowed the company to weather the year.
First priority for new spending is on increasing the slate of available opportunities that have attractive returns.
This includes investment in programming, movies, and video games.
Purchased only a modest number of shares in Q4, expecting to increase that throughout the year as they believe the current stock price is still at an attractive price.

Question highlights:

No further information is forthcoming in the short term from Disney or the Chinese on the Shanghai park until the deal is formally done.
Bob sees the largest opportunity for revenue growth in FY’10 in advertising. Continue to perform for the next year as if the economy will not improve.
Tom also mentioned that almost everybody in company got no salary increase in FY’09.
Current discount is a slightly less costly (and therefore slightly less advantageous) than the previous offers this year.
Bob sees the ‘Keychest’ initiative as a consumer focused technology that will allow the consumer to essentially ‘buy once, consume in many places without having to repay’. Of course, expect that ‘keychest’ enabled content will be able to garner a higher price than a use on only one device type of purchase.
On the Dreamworks distribution deal, probably will be very little impact in 2010. Possibly one film in 2010, but probably more likely in 2011.

The question session was longer than this of course, but not a lot of other unique discussion there.

Affiliated Computer Services to be bought by Xerox

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:02:00 +0000

You many wonder what in the heck that title has to do with Disney and a blog named ‘All Things Disney’… but then again, if you’ve found my little blog on the internet then you are, my friend, not your NORMAL Disneyana fan. No?!

And given that premise you’d know then that I wouldn’t suggest something unless it was related, and of course you’d be correct…

Far strung throughout the Disney empire is a highly technical shop. They make all kinds of things happen that bring people together, work tirelessly behind the scenes to make sure things are running smoothly and that everybody has a good time (or is being productive). Who might that be you say? Imagineering? Parks and Resorts folks? Neh, I say… it’s really none other than Disney IT!

See not all that long ago, or so the story I’ve been told goes, Disney let each of the BU’s (that’s business units in management speak) run their own IT operations. Each BU was like it’s own little ‘kingdom’ shall we say, to abuse a metaphor given the subject.

But for a company the size of Disney that’s not always the most efficient or effective way to manage your resources. So they began to coordinate the IT centers inside each of the BU’s. Michael Eisner also named Michael Tasooji the first Disney CIO in 2000. Michael stayed on until leaving Disney in 2003 for The Gap Inc., and just recently left there according to LinkedIn to start his own company Digital Innovation Technology.

Frankly it’s not exactly clear what happened next from the outside, but given the turmoil in the company at the time, it’s probably safe to assume that the official CIO job went empty until Disney hired Tony Scott from GM (yes, THAT GM) in early 2005.

A lot of stuff was made out of Tony’s GM days, but the REAL answer was in his previous years at the drug maker Bristol-Meyers Squibb. A speaking profile says this is where he ‘led the transformation of their technology infrastructure organization to a shared services model and the development of a corporate infrastructure to support implementation of SAP and web-based technologies.’

And that’s where ACS comes in. Yep, you knew we’d get there eventually no?

In June of 2005 Disney announced that they were outsourcing almost all of their IT services. And guess you’ve figured out by now who won? ACS of course. At the time the contract was for 7 years and approx. $610 million.

Tony (and probably some others as well) also brought with them from those drug industry days a passion for IT services management. Today the most widely known standard here is the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (or ITIL) which was published in 2006 under v2 and more recently in v3. Which of course is how Disney now operates most of their outsourced IT services as well (ITIL that is), including the contract under which ACS operates.

Disney also has other outsourced IT services contracts covering other parts of their infrastructure requirements. Where ACS does the ‘services’ side of the offering for instance, HP does all the print services. Cell phone, land lines, etc. etc. etc… all come under the umbrella at some point of Disney IT.

Tony left Disney in 2008 to go work for Bill as his CIO. And in May of 2008 Bob Iger and crew appointed Susan O’Day, the current CIO of Disney to her current position. It’s probably little wonder by the way, that Susan also came from the drug industry, where she also spent 12 years at a little drug company named: Bristol-Meyers Squibb.

So there is how today’s $5.7 billion offer for Dallas based ACS by the Norwalk, CT based Xerox affects the world of ‘all things Disney’.

Disney Cruise Line goes on media blitz!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 13:59:00 +0000

Starting on September 11, 2009, Disney seems to have quietly updated their cruise line loyalty program that goes by the name of Castaway Club.

On that day they program split into 3 tiers: silver, gold and platinum. I’m surprised that they didn’t talk about this at the D23 presentation I went to last week, but here are the facts about the tiers:

	Silver Castaway Begins after your 1st completed cruise.	Gold Castaway Begins after your 5th completed cruise.	Platinum Castaway Begins after your 10th completed cruise.
Castaway Club Benefits at a Glance
AT-HOME BENEFITS
Insider Exclusives Just for members—Webcasts, info, tips and news.	•	•	•
Early Access to Online Activity Planning Advance booking for onboard amenities and shore excursions.	90 days prior to sailing	105 days prior to sailing	120 days prior to sailing
Dedicated Phone Number (800) 449-3380—your direct line for info and assistance.	•	•	•
Early Booking Opportunities Be among the first to book our newest itineraries and ships 7 days before the general public.		•	•
ONBOARD BENEFITS
Exclusive Cruise Terminal Check-In Sail through the boarding process in a separate, members-only line.	•	•	•
Welcome Back Stateroom Gift* Be welcomed back with a gift unique to your membership level.	•	•	•
Special Onboard Booking Offer While on board, enjoy special savings on future cruises.	•	•	•
Castaway Club Onboard Reception Meet and mingle with the ship's officers at a private party on voyages 4-nights and longer.		•	•
Special Merchandise Offering Take advantage of special onboard shopping opportunities.		•	•
Priority Check-In at Cruise Terminal Enjoy concierge priority boarding check-in at the cruise terminal.			•
Exclusive Platinum Experiences** Unforgettable Disney fun created just for Platinum members.			•
Complimentary Dinner at Palo*** Savor an elegant dinner at Palo, on us.			•

* One gift per stateroom based on highest level Castaway Club member in stateroom.
** Exclusive Platinum experiences are subject to change without notice.
*** Offer includes dining service fee ($15) for one dinner. Available to Platinum Castaway member and Guests staying in member's stateroom. Must be 18 years of age or older.

Additionally there will be a live broadcast online from New York City on October 29, at 4:15 PM with more details about the new Disney Dream ship currently under construction at Meyer Werft in Papenburg, Germany. Appears that it will be broadcast through the Disney Cruise website.

And lastly, Disney will unveil a new 6 story tall Sailor Mickey balloon at this years Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.

I’ll try to have some more D23 stuff up soon!

Disney Cruise Line announcements at D23

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 02:23:00 +0000

We were on hand to see the Disney Cruise Line presentation on Friday morning. Of course the big announcement was that when the Disney Wonder moves permanently to the west coast in 2011, that DCL WILL be making cruises to Alaska despite previous rumor to the contrary.

They just won’t be making any of them to Glacier Bay. Instead the Wonder will leave from the port of Vancouver, BC and sail the waters of the southern Alaskan including Juneau, Ketchikan and Skagway. The full press release in case you missed it is here.

The interesting thing about the press release is that is has MORE data than was actually given in the presentation! The Wonder is going into drydock in October for an undisclosed period, but the press release DOES mention that they will be adding a new dining option on Deck 10 called Outlook Café, which will connect to the Cove Café immediately below, which is the coffee/cigar/whiskey bar in the adults only area. No pictures were given, but I take this to mean that they’ll be adding a new glassed in area on the upper deck (Deck 10) that will either take the place of the teen hang out in ‘the stack’ or wrap around the stack in some fashion to provide the vista views promised.

Only two real disappointments in this presentation I thought.

The first was that we waited in line almost an hour for what was support to be a 60 minute discussion. We thought we’d get a few announcements and maybe some discussion about the cruise line, the new ships, how the cruise line business works, etc. etc. What we got instead was a 30 minute very nicely put together marketing blitz that while intimate in size (only 198 people were let in the room that the day before had held over twice that many for the Imagineering discussion), wasn’t so intimate in presentation.

The second was that almost NOTHING was said about what was going to be going on with the new Disney Dream. It’s suppose to report on duty in 2011 so that the Wonder can leave for the west coast and presumably so that the Magic can leave again for Europe. The only announcement really was what the statue would be (that of Admiral Donald).

Not much else to share with you on that front, though they did have a model in the Imagineering area. Here are a couple of shots showing the front and back of the new ship (they didn’t stitch together very well of the overall length).

So we’ll have to wait until later to hear more…

All pictures in this post are copyright The Walt Disney Company.

More D23

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 07:27:00 +0000

Here are a couple of nice panoramic photos I stitched together from D23. It’s been a BUSY day, with the crowd more than tripling on Day 3 and the lines have been VERY VERY long.

Here is a picture of the Expo Hall in the center, just to give you an idea of how big it is. This is ONE of three areas and the main entry area. To my left is much of the area of pictures I posted yesterday with Consumer Products and Disneyana. To my right is the Dream Store.

And behind me is this:

Which is the Imagineering area.

Inside are things like the following…

The first are several models of the new Cars Land area coming to DCA. Below you can see two panoramas I stitched together of the same model, which as you can tell is quite large!

Next is the Animatronics area.

Which has a small area at the end which is where Wall*E and Lucky have been performing.

The next area has a model of the new Disney Dream cruise ship, which I have to retake pictures of before I can post them as well as a large model of the new Hawaii DVC.

And of course last are the models and markups for the new expansions coming to Hong Kong Disneyland. Here is a panoramic picture of the model:

More to come!

Greetings from D23!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 05:56:00 +0000

Yep, I’m out here on the west coast along with a group of ‘dyed-in-the-wool’ Disney fans to take in Disney’s first, modern attempt to a build a sanctioned/official fan community. We are just getting over with day 2 (and boy, was it a full day). I didn’t get to post anything last night about day 1 due to some technical issues, but I’ll cover that in this installment as well.

Nothing much to especially mention from our trip a couple of weeks ago to WDW. The park is still running, the hours are still being adjusted more or less on the fly as required, crowds seemed to be good, if a bit spotty, and as is typical this time of the year: IT WAS HOT! So hot, we took 2-3 hour off every afternoon to leave the parks and seek Starbucks and A/C while letting the little one take in a nap.

BTW, up front, if you hear of something you don’t think is being covered at D23, drop me a line at michael@allthingsdiz.com and I’ll try to follow up before the event ends Sunday night.

So first, the general overall impressions after 2 days of go-go-go and in no particular order.

The Anaheim Convention Center has in general done a good job of ‘swallowing’ the crowd yesterday and today, though I’d say Friday was bigger than Thursday which makes sense given that more locals turned out today than yesterday. It’s hard to get a firm idea of how tickets are working since the only way to know is by the color of wristbands and even then they have two different versions of some colors: one for D23 members and one without.

That’s not to say that there haven’t been some minor growing pains with crowds and lines. Several of the more popular seminars have had lines where the wait has been in excess of 40-50 minutes and lines much longer than the venue could hold. On day 1 some of the lines were so long we ended up only seeing one seminar due to the distance between venues (it’s a fairly large center after all).

Disney has done good by their goal of including the broader Disneyana community in the convention as well (though I’m sure they probably ‘paid’ for the honor of being part of the Expo as would be typical of a convention). Many of the more popularly known Disney related fan sites are represented in person on the Expo floor, which I’ll cover below. Many of the panels have also been hosted by folks who are either retired from the company or from the broader Disneyana community as well. For instance, the panel on the new art documentary ‘El Group’ was hosted by none other than Jim Hill of Jim Hill Media.

Likewise, I have to give big props to Disney in terms of general production value. So far there have been lots of surprises (good kinds) and overall fairly well produced (and scripted) larger and even many of the smaller settings. There are some things to smooth out in the future, but overall this thing has gone off very well so far.

I also have to believe from what I’ve seen that it’s very true that D23 has the support of the top folks at the company as shown by the tons of people that have shown up from the company. I’ve seen Tony Baxter more than once in the halls for instance, as well as tons of salaried cast members just to point out a couple instances.

EXPO

The Expo certainly takes up the largest part of the overall venue and most of the first floor. The main areas of course surround the major elements of the overall company, and most of the consumer facing parts are well represented. The Disney Consumer Products are also has Disney sanctioned licenses like Lego, Hasbro and Hallmark. There is also a fairly large store for D23 stuff as you’d expect, though much of the ‘unique’ D23 stuff is actually available only through the disneystore.com website. They have demo items to see of those, but you can’t actually buy them here.

Here are some photos from the Disney and Disney sponsored areas:

And here are just a couple from the Disneyana area:

Day 1

We were a little late in getting here yesterday due to other work commitments, so I missed the Bob Iger keynote in the morning as well as the latest Legends induction ceremony. No doubt you’ve seen the pictures of the distinguished list of individuals inducted this year and everybody said Bob did a good job with both his presentation and his MC duties. No major announcements during that keynote that I heard or that I’ve read, just good solid discussions and about 30 minutes of the upcoming ‘Princess and the Frog’.

We did manage to make it to the Imagineering Legends discussion which was good, with that slightly irreverent fun you get when you get these guys together.

Marty Sklar and Bob Gurr joshed with each other (Marty saying they were still in an ongoing debate from the early 80’s over whether Bob quit or Marty fired him. *laughs*), while Don Iwerks and Alice Davis had some great stories. Blaine Gibson had a couple good stories too add too. And of course you can’t have a good meeting like this without a straight man, which was more than taken care of by X. Atencio!

I’ll try to get some Day 2 stuff up tomorrow.

Headed to the World

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 22:51:00 +0000

A quick separate post to let you know I’ll be leaving for ‘the World’ tomorrow night for a quick pre-labor day trip. $48 discounted rooms at a Value resort were just too hard to pass up… Disney knows how to ply the weakness in this family with PIN offers!

If there is anything you’ve recently noted or were interested to find out more about, let me know and I’ll do my best to look into it and post next week when we return.

Are you going to D23?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 22:29:00 +0000

Sorry it’s been a bit since my last post, things have been a whorl wind around here with the end of summer school (and my final class in my MBA thank you very much!) and work. Yeah, I have a ‘boring’ day job too… so this site takes a back seat to that when things are hoppin’ at work like they have been. It doesn’t hurt that things around Disney have been quiet as we expected with the exception of the recent string of unfortunate accidents. Are prayers go out to those who’ve recently lost a loved one at Disney.

The fun news this month has been the build up to D23 of course, which I’m happy to report I (along with a friend and former Disney employee) will be attending. Just today in fact it appears that Disney has begun issuing the online tickets for the Expo.

Here is a peek at what they’ve sent to those of us to date:

Dear E-Ticket holder,

Attached please find a PDF of your E-Ticket(s) to the D23 Expo. Please save this PDF to your computer and PRINT ALL necessary tickets. If you ordered multiple tickets, you MUST PRINT OUT each individual ticket. You will need to redeem your E-Ticket in the main lobby of the Anaheim Convention Center on the date of your confirmed attendance. Please make note of the Expo Hours listed below.

Parking: Parking is available at the Anaheim Convention Center for $12 a day. Per Anaheim Convention Center policy, no special or complimentary parking rates will be offered to Annual Passholders at any of the lots, including overflow lots, for this event.

Shuttles: The Anaheim Resort Transit will operate buses to and from the Anaheim Convention Center. Please check their schedule (www.rideart.org) for times and pick up/drop off locations.

Hours: Ticketing will begin at 7 a.m. each day of the Expo. The show floor will open at 8 a.m. for D23 Members and 9 a.m. for the general public. The show floor will close at 5 p.m, with additional programming at the Expo theaters continuing throughout the evening.

Line Formation: No on property line ups will be allowed at the Anaheim Convention Center prior to 5 am.

For additional information please visit www.D23Expo.com.

We look forward to seeing you at the Expo!

The box in the bottom right has my name, a bar code and the length of the pass (a 4 day in my case).

Disney did a great job with the Expo website and the links through to hotels in the area of the convention center as well. Bravo on that. we’ll be staying literally right across the street from the convention center, so it should be fun!

Somebody can’t count

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 20:27:00 +0000

You saw this all over the Disney related web on Friday:

Disney hotel workers reject contract proposal by 92 percent

When put that way it sounds like a resounding defeat for the Disney folks and a great triumph for the democracy of the Union.

Until you read the article a little closer… Here is the excerpt:

Exactly 1,079 of the current 2,100 rank-and-file union members that wash dishes, clean rooms and wait tables at the three Disney-owned hotels in the resort voted on the contract proposal at the Disneyland Hotel, said Unite Here 11 President Tom Walsh.

So read that closely: what it really says is 92% of the 51.38% of the 2,100 union members who did vote, didn’t vote for the current proposal.

The Union did have a simple majority (as defined by more than 50%), but not a super majority (typically 75%). What is required is probably set by the Union in accordance with the Union’s charter and rules.

I’m all for the Union doing it’s best to defend and improve the lives of its members. I come from a mid-west pro-union family myself. The Union has the right to negotiate on behalf of its workers to make sure they get the best benefit from working for Disney that they can. Disney on the other hand of course has the right to want to control costs and keep this contract in line with other contracts, etc. etc.

What I’m not for are one sided discussions when the facts in the rest of the article don’t support the title.