Rumor Dropping the "Walt" from "Walt Disney World"

Goofyernmost

Well-Known Member
It's so crazy, I could see them doing it. Think about the merch sellout that would occur.. folks would snap up anything "Walt Disney World".. hell it could be "Glowing Away" for, you know 2, 3 years... cause it would sell that merch.
Dropping Walt from the name would accomplish nothing except cause more confusion among the proliferation of an uninformed population. People may not always say Walt Disney World and shorten it to just Disney World, but they know it is Walt Disney World. There are many that often times need that distinction to easily identify that WDW is on the East Coast and DL is on the West Coast. Seems petty but is important if they don't want people to not go where they intended. Guest Services is busy enough as it is. Remember that those of us that are on discussion boards like this are a small, tiny, miniscule minority of people that go to the parks. The non-obsessed are the ones that need that clarity.
 

Walter Elias Disney

Well-Known Member
“Walt Disney World is a tribute to the philosophy and life of Walter Elias Disney … and to the talents, the dedication and the loyalty of the entire Disney organization that made Walt Disney’s dream come true. May Walt Disney World bring joy and inspiration and New Knowledge to all who come to this happy place … a Magic Kingdom where the young at heart of all ages can laugh and play and learn – together.”
Monday, Oct. 25, 1971, Roy Disney
Screen Shot 2022-07-30 at 8.26.19 AM.png
 

WorldExplorer

Well-Known Member
Doing it to be closer to what people call the park would still be pointless. People shorten things to make them easier to say all the time. It's not like people are going to accidentally mistake it for that OTHER Disney World in Florida because they forgot the Walt part.

And they keep filling the park with attractions that have long names that the grand majority are never going to use. How many people are actually calling Remy's Ratatouille Adventure that? Or Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind? Splash Mountain was already too many syllables for most people; Tiana's Bayou Adventure doesn't have a chance. If things not matching what people call was was actually an issue then they wouldn't be doing much to make it better for themselves.

(And yes, of course, there are plenty of older rides whose names get shortened all the time.)
 
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MisterPenguin

President of Animal Kingdom
Premium Member
With all due respect, you joined the forums in 2016. How do you know nobody had a problem with it? I'm not attacking in that question. Just wondering what your source is, sincerely. I wasn't around these boards when they changed the name either. The name change predated my joining the forums by a couple of years, so I can't accurately say if a bunch of folks on here complained about the name change back then.

Btw, I keep reading people saying that Walt never stepped foot in WDW. True, but his direct influence is ALL OVER THE PARK, in so many way including the fact that imagineers he worked with for years designed it with love in the wake of his death as they felt he would've wanted it. They couldn't pull it off as he planned, but they did what they could. The "Florida Project" was his vision, and never would've happened without him. Personally, I'm not taking a side in the debate. I don't think the rumor has enough merit to even debate. I get so worked up about so many things. It's not worth getting worked up about an unrealistic suggestion like this. JMO
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>
 

Daddyoh

Active Member
Let me just start out by saying this is a rumor from Jim Hill's Disney Dish podcast and should be taken with a very big spoonful of salt (that doesn't help the medicine go down at all).

If this rumor is to be believed, Bob Chapek and Josh D'Amaro plan to announce that "Walt Disney World" will become "Disney World" at D23 Expo next month.
For me it would be the "LAST STRAW".
 

"El Gran Magnifico"

Mr Flibble is Very Cross.
I liken it to the “Idiocracy Principle”. Most don’t want to expend the extra effort to say, or write, or even think - Walt Disney World

It’s already been shortened. Most I know will say “I’m going to Disney next week” or “Hey, just got back from Disney”.

I’d reason that within another decade or so Disney will be too much and we’ll be on Dis.

Give it a quarter century and it’ll be known as “D”.

Of course, we’ll all be drinking Brawndo at that point. It’s got what plants crave.
 

solidyne

Well-Known Member
Hi, solidyne! I'm not sure if your post is about me, but I didn't intend to misrepresent what was said on the show (as I explained in a later post, I couldn't find which episode the tidbit was in). I said nothing about Jim's track record - only stressing that it was a rumor at this point as I did as many times as I could in the original post.

If you or Len know where this rumor started, I'll gladly update my original post with the latest information; but the closest I was able to find to a source was the Disney Dish podcast.

I'm sorry for the confusion.
Sorry, VJ. Not directed at you! Your posts, taken word for word, are accurate. Unfortunately, the general drift of comments that followed seemed to conflate your first paragraph (where the rumor was mentioned) with your second (certain contents of the rumor that were not mentioned on that podcast). Some folks seemed to think that Jim was predicting a D23 announcement.

I'll add a note to my post, making it more of an advisory to others.
 

Pepper's Ghost

Well-Known Member
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.
 
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Pepper's Ghost

Well-Known Member
I liken it to the “Idiocracy Principle”. Most don’t want to expend the extra effort to say, or write, or even think - Walt Disney World

It’s already been shortened. Most I know will say “I’m going to Disney next week” or “Hey, just got back from Disney”.

I’d reason that within another decade or so Disney will be too much and we’ll be on Dis.

Give it a quarter century and it’ll be known as “D”.

Of course, we’ll all be drinking Brawndo at that point. It’s got what plants crave.
Love that movie!
welcome to costco.gif
 

Pepper's Ghost

Well-Known Member
For me it would be the "LAST STRAW".
Of all the terrible decisions made by TWDC managment in recent years, removing a 4-letter word is what would stop you from returning? 😁 That's totally cool, and I agree I think they should keep his first name on it, but it wouldn't be the reason to keep me away. There have been plenty of other reasons they've kept me away recently though. 😁
 

Mindy55

Active Member
Walt Disney World is a tribute to the philosophy and life of Walter Elias Disney...

Is this going away too, Bob? What is the reasoning for this?
I don’t think it’s a stretch to go as far as to dissociate from the man and the mouse who created it all. Regardless of Walt being from.a very different time and all that, there has been a lot of dialogue, labels, cautionary verbiage etc., actually disassociating the current company from the era(s) that they were founded in, as well as the people responsible for the vision
 

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