Note that I didn't say "nobody had a problem with Disney*MGM Studio Parsk's new name."**
Disney Hollywood Studios didn't get a new name like Iger said it would. So, what I said was meant to be joke, in that it (DHS) *didn't* get a new name, just like Walt Disney World isn't going to get a new name.
Also, with all due respect, after Walt's death, it wasn't "the imagineers" which created the rest of WDW. It was a board of directors and other CEOs, of which, Roy had already resigned. They chose to ditch Walt's idea of EPCOT for their own (a permanent World's Fair). They chose to slapdash up a *studios park* and to create a theme park around a zoo. Sure, they attempted to continue the basics of what makes a good theme park good, but to keep attributing everything that came after Walt's death as if it came from Walt himself is rather naive. Shall we attribute to Walt and his influence Superstar Limo and the succeeding iterations of Figment?
It is especially odd to attribute to Walt and the Walt-minded imagineers a studio theme park thrown together in a hurry (and it showed) just to beat Universal to the punch. That's *not* the influence I would think that people would want to attribute Walt.
**I know people do have a problem with the rename of Disney-MGM Studio Park because they keep on calling it "MGM Studios" which was *never* its name and had almost nothing to do with MGM. I sure Walt would have loved for what his imagineers threw together to be forever called "MGM." <rolleyes>
Sorry, I misunderstood your post.
Regarding the parts about Walt, I completely agree with this part of your post
"to keep attributing everything that came after Walt's death as if it came from Walt himself is rather naive". Spot on that it shouldn't be that way. My response was that people (not you to my recollection) have been saying Walt never stepped foot in WDW, so who cares about removing his name. My point is that it's absolutely true that Walt never set foot in WDW, but the MK was built in his honor and in many ways how he would've wanted. I also stated that the imagineers couldn't pull off the project as he envisioned it, that's to say a living community of tomorrow, high tech (for it's time), people actually living and working in the community, and having a theme park at one end of it as a source of entertainment. Even when Walt was alive, the plan was overly ambitious and not likely to succeed, and if documentaries are accurate, many people even told Walt he wouldn't be able to pull it off as he planned. Btw, all my info is from documentaries, and I'm assuming they're probably mostly accurate. It's not like I worked with Walt. I wasn't even alive before they froze his head or whatever.
That said, TWDC tried to bring to life as much of his vision as realistically possible, and absolutely most of it was done by imagineers with their admiration for Walt and his memory in mind. MGM and AK came much later, after nearly 20 years of changeover within the company, and a lot of talent and respect for it's founder lost in one way or another. After 20 years, anyone's legacy and influence will change. You can't blame MGM's and AK's poorly planned starts on Walt, or those who worked with him 20+ years earlier.
Also, about a BOD and CEO having influence on major investments... at a high level, absolutely they do of course. They set a budget and a vision, but they do so with the detailed input of thousands of minions. With specific exceptions which I'll mention in a second, a CEO or BOD doesn't get their hands dirty with the details and designs of the parks, rides, or even that they envision what they see is going to be done. There are multiple layers between decision makers and the execution of such projects. Across all facets of business, many CEO's or exec's heads roll due to incompetence below them, even though they might have a good vision. As a leader they also need to find the right people below them to drive towards that vision. On the other hand sometimes companies just hire execs with poor vision such as [insert your least favorite Disney CEO's name here]. With the exception of a visionary who starts a company, once you get to 2nd generation CEOs and leaders, you start to lose the desire by those individuals to want to steer things so precisely, or the desire to get into the weeds like Walt did. That's when your below C-suite leaders plus your imagineers have more influence. They package their visions into a big picture, put numbers to it, and bring it to top-level management for approval. Of course that's when the CEO or BOD say that the project is 35% more than they have to spend and to start scaling it back. That CEO or BOD doesn't get their hands dirty in the process. They leave that to others.
Edit: fixed one sentence based on a hanging thought that changed when I changed the wording before it.
