I doubt many here will like what I'm going to tell you because it's not simple and it's not straightforward and I've noticed in the Disney fan community that many people only see three things: black, white and Pixie Dust.
The story might as well have been co-written by Bruce Vaughn. But I'd encourage anyone here who read it and thinks they really understood the meaning and intent to go back and reread it, slowly and carefully. Take each sentence apart before posting anything here.
First, let me tell you what the story was NOT about. That would be the Country Bear Jamboree. If you think that's what it was about, you're mistaken.
Let's look at a bit from said story:
<<The overhaul “was done with a lot of love,” said Bruce E. Vaughn, chief creative executive at Walt Disney Imagineering. “You want to be really sensitive to the original spirit. But tastes also change, how people consume media changes. We must keep our product relevant.” >>
While I love the Spirited reference (no, I don't think Bruce was speaking to anyone in particular), you need to understand that the quote is what the story is about and more to the point Next Gen. Yes, that story was Disney's first push in the big time mainstream media to talk about how they're about to reinvent (destroy completely?) the Disney park-going experience.
It's the proverbial shot across the bow so when they continue to tinker with classic attractions like Mansion, Pirates, BTMRR, Small World with everything from unneeded queues to interactive effects that break immediately to mermaid projections, they can say they are doing it for us. Well, not for those of us who remember what Disney was say in the 60s-90s, but us as in the fan community that often because we don't want 'our' Disney World to be museum. Old Dead Guy Walt said he didn't want that for his worldwide empire of parks he was planning (along with his timeshare and hotel empire) when he sat on that bench watching Diane and Sharon on the merry go round munching on peanuts.
I'm sure y'all saw the museum reference in that story. Got it's own paragraph so no one would miss it.
Disney must be relevant says Bruce. I wonder where he was (well, I know where he was) when WDW was crumbling from a decade plus of abject neglect and the least capital investment as was possible.
Tastes change, after all. Of course, I never did see CBJ plagued by disinterest even when Disney allowed it (like many attractions in O-Town) to fall into disrepair.
This was also the 'nothing is untouchable so when we remove the CoP or take seven minutes out of the AA understand we are doing so because of the iPad and sites like WDWMAGIC, not because our parks are packed capacity-wise, our FP+ program will make things many times worse and we have no intentions of adding attractions regularly to our parks because well, we aren't Universal' message for fanbois.
I see some posts above, including by one of the folks who was mentioned in the piece (enjoy the 15 minutes while they last, we can't all be Jon Cryer!) talking about this couldn't possibly be placed by Disney because it has GULP!!!, GASP!!!, GROAN!!! ... negative comments in it.
There are some to be sure. But the New York Times isn't the Disney Parks Blog and Brooks isn't Blondie, Tommy or one of the Too Many Jasons. There has to be the appearance of being fair and balanced. And the overriding nature of the story is quite positive. The arching feature was that fans are too hypercritical and focusing on those pesky little things instead of living in reality.
You may not get why those comments are in there, but just the fact the Times went the VERY unusual route for them of quoting fans on fan forums and in the Twitterverse is another tacit message that it's all about technology for Disney. Why phone an expert on the entertainment industry when a fanboi's rant can be pulled up immediately and used like an anonymous source (of course, a little push in the right direction from 'someone' at Disney likely made it much easier for Brooks, the pride of Montana)?
Of course, no posts relating to the REAL reason the show was hacked (to improve daily turnstile counts) made it into that story, did they? When Mickey is helping write a story, you must understand the story gets written with one less finger.
Back to the story:
<<The faster pace, Mr. Vaughn said, reflects the speedier way that people speak today and the rise of interactive media. It’s not necessarily that attention spans are shorter, he said, it’s that kids raised on video games are not as accustomed to more passive entertainment experiences. >>
Huh? ... I thought we were reading a piece on those good old Country Bears (also known as some of Lee's kin!), yet now we're talking once more about interactivity? What exactly does interactivity and connectivity have to do with the show?
It may be hard to grasp that, but understand what I am telling you IS the truth. I have worked in media and PR and I know of what I speak.
As for Bruce's role, I can't help but wonder if he read the story before an editor did. I've seen stories on Disney in the Times and countless publications. The one thing they have in common is they ALWAYS get things wrong. Names, dates, history ... small facts that only fanbois (and a select group of them at that) would know. This story is 100% clean. There aren't any mistakes that jump out at you and you say "wait, the Hall of Presidents didn't move from DL ... or Space Mountain didn't open in 1972 ... or it isn't the Main Street Light Parade.'' Bottom line, it's chockfull of the type of small details I'd expect in a book by Dave Smith. That just doesn't happen.
The readership of the NYT, myself excluded (maybe a few hundred others), has ZERO interest in the CBJ. Most probably don't know what the heck it is and couldn't care less it does exist or that the show is now 11 minutes and not 16. But they would care about Disney's Next Gen program, the technology behind it and what it could mean down the line for not only Disney, but other corporations as well.
This was the first little salvo in a big push to get people behind Disney's huge tracking/data mining initiative. Amusing that it was in the NYT. My Mouse Ears are off to the folks behind it, but the battle is just starting. Never good to get too cocky too soon (unless you're at an Imagineering-Fanboi mix and mingle!)
