People on this site frequently opine about how WDW "used to be" 15 to 20, heck, even back to when it first opened in the 70's. I find that there is this desire for WDW to have been able to exist in a type of Norman Rockwell style time capsule. And believe me, I am totally for that as I am all about nostalgia. I have posted on here before about how I lived where milk was delivered by a milk man every few days to our house and a bakery truck from a local farm used to drive to everyone's house once a week and my mom and I used to walk into the back of it and pick out dessert for the week. That is what I remember as service, and also as those small special memories that stick out in my mind. Those types of things don't happen anymore. That is as unfortunate as life gets and I don't expect Disney to be any different. Disney exists in this world and is run by people that live in this world so I expect the same results over time. I have just decided to roll with it I suppose and try to enjoy life as it comes. Money rules the world!
The one thing that is ironic to me is that people speak about how WDW is not what it used to be and I think that the technology that I am typing this post on has helped to ruin the magical quality that was WDW. To me, there are no surprises anymore in the world. Do you remember back in the day when Darth Vader declared that he was Luke's father? I still remember the audible gasp in the theater when that happened. That sort of surprise, that type of preexistent ambiguity is almost impossible to achieve. And we all feed into it nowadays. We now know almost everything that is going to happen in WDW today weeks, months or even years before it happens (also cause it takes them that long to build something). Think back to when Disney underhandedly purchased the land for the Florida Project. That wouldn't even be possible cause danlb_2000 would post permits about it no sooner than it happened and the surprise would be lost. People would be flying over in planes taking pictures of the development and posting time lapse construction videos. Spirit (and others) would start leaking out blueprints or ideas that WDW would not want let out and it would be picked apart by people from several different continents who would otherwise not even know each other. There is almost no more mystery in this world. Disney used to be good at that.
Disney is also buying into that technology, obviously, with MDE and MM+. For those that are older, it would almost shock me if they thought that this new-fangled technology was a good thing for WDW. For some of the younger generation, however, I guarantee that they will eat it up. There are some twenty-somthings that work for me that don't even own a television (can you believe that)! They use only their computers/laptops/whatever to do everything now. This fits right in with the "now" generation and I think that is what WDW is aiming for. And that is the aspect of this that goes back to ruining the mystique, or adventure, of visiting WDW. People used to use a book (made of paper!) as there sole planning guide. When my wife and I first went (first trip ever) to WDW in 2009, we used books to plan the trip. I still remember the feeling of awe when we walked down Main Street USA at sunset and thinking "holysh..!" I just don't think that type of reaction is possible nowadays. And that is a shame.
