Magic Bands coming to DL?

mickEblu

Well-Known Member
Have you had much luck showing up late over the past few years or so? They've been cracking down hard on FP windows ever since Magicband went live in FL to prep CMs out here. For the most part, based on my experience, they've been pretty strict on enforcing it but I'm sure there's always exceptions.

Really? I've probably showed up late 5-6 times in the last year and I never had a problem. 2-3 times I was one hour to one hour and a half late. The one time I tried to get on a ride 10 minutes early they had me wait until 5 minutes before.

I don't make it a point to be late but I'm also not trying to haul @$$ or deviate from something I may want to do at the moment just to make my fast pass return time. I guess I always figured it would be really bad PR to turn away people that are late with fast passes especially with the crowds and increasing prices. I realize there has to be some boundaries though or the system will collapse.
 

Curious Constance

Well-Known Member
I ordered an embroidered coat of arms as a wedding present for my brother and his wife many years ago, and definitely had some problems. I ordered it in late April/early May for a wedding in mid-July. According to their original estimates, it should have arrived by the beginning of July, but didn't end up getting there until September

That said, it's a really nice piece and looks great in their home. In the long run, it didn't really matter that it showed up late since they were so distracted by the wedding preparations followed by the honeymoon, but it was still disappointing that it took so much longer than they had estimated

But given the price that I paid, I suspect they only have to sell a couple things a day to cover their costs, which could explain why they've lasted for so long. Like the former jewelry shop in New Orleans Square, I assume they've been with Disney forever and have pretty favorable terms on their lease, which would make it easy to stay in business for minimal effort. It's the type of shop that really adds to the depth of the park experience even if you don't buy anything, and DLR is really lacking them

And from Disney's perspective, there's no reason to get rid of them. The space is too small to amount to anything meaningful (even queue space), especially since substantial ADA modifications would be required if they were to alter it in any way. It's easier to just keep collecting rent money than to change it into something else
That's a nice wedding present. I'm impressed!
 

FerretAfros

Well-Known Member
That's a nice wedding present. I'm impressed!
I'm not a horrible person all the time. Just, you know, the overwhelming majority of the time...
Wait, does this mean I won't be able to show up to my fast pass appointments late anymore? Or does anyone think they will program the system to accept fast passes as long as they are not early?
In WDW the system is set up to allow you to arrive up to 5 minutes early or 15 minutes late. Additionally, the CMs at the FP+ entrance have tablets that show when your FP is valid, so they can tell you when to return. They also have the ability to modify your FP reservation on the spot (to let you in a few minutes early or late, or to add an extra guest, etc), and the change will be reflected at the second FP touchpoint in the queue

Of greater concern for DLR is the bottlenecks that the scanners create. It takes no time at all for a person to collect a family's stack of paper FPs, but it takes a few seconds for each person to scan in with the readers. It's not unusual in WDW to see 50+ people backed up into the walkways waiting to scan in. It causes bottlenecks in WDW's wide open spaces, but it would be disastrous with DLR's tight layout. Part of this could be solved with faster scanners (the animated lights are part of the problem, rather than a quick switch to green), but at the end of the day it is always going to be more time consuming for guests to scan individually than to hand a stack of paper tickets to a CM, and that system still causes crowding near attraction entrances
 

Jahona

Well-Known Member
I think it was in another thread on here maybe (or earlier on this one), but someone did, in fact, remove an RFID chip from their ticket. These chips are literally paper thin these days and you barely can tell they're in there. Those scanners being tested are definitely not visual code scanners.

Here is the image that jrlbc06 posted of revealing of what looks like a small nfc chip inside the Space Mountain FP ticket. Also I'm not sure what you mean by not visual code scanners. The ones they are testing are your run of the mill barcode scanners. You can see the cast of light being emitted from the protrusion at the top of the unit.



I'm guessing the scanners in these pics are just temporary for testing and anything that's permanently installed will look much better....
The CM main entrance guest passes (plastic cards like APs) at WDW, for example, have the chips embedded right inside of them and behave just like the magicbands.

The scanners being tested this week are leaps and bounds over what was used for last years test. To me I wouldn't be surprised if these were near final design.

http://www./wp-content/uploads/2015/10/DSC05131-550x413.jpg
 

dweezil78

Well-Known Member
Here is the image that jrlbc06 posted of revealing of what looks like a small nfc chip inside the Space Mountain FP ticket. Also I'm not sure what you mean by not visual code scanners. The ones they are testing are your run of the mill barcode scanners. You can see the cast of light being emitted from the protrusion at the top of the unit.

Ah yes, I see what you are talking about. Looks like maybe a hybrid unit to accommodate both the old-school barcodes and the RFID chips then, eh? Assuming the big circular pad is not there just for decoration...
 

dweezil78

Well-Known Member
The no storymaker thing sounds good to me. Seems very corporate.

Just out of curiosity, why do you think it seems corporate? It's more or less a next-gen version of having ET say your name at the end of ET Adventure. I find it pretty hard to find fault with a more personalized guest experience. Also thought it was pretty rad to load the Disney Magic app while in WDW and find videos of MY actual ToT and Mine Train rides sitting there waiting for me! IMO, they are putting the technology to good use over there despite its initial flaws.
 

jrlbc06

Active Member
The RFID scanners from the other day now have barcode readers on them. The fast passes do not have any chips in them and rather the barcode on the bottom is scanned to give admittance. Tons of supervisors around observing again and only happening at Space Mountain. Seems like they're trying a couple different options this week
 

Californian Elitist

Well-Known Member
Just out of curiosity, why do you think it seems corporate? It's more or less a next-gen version of having ET say your name at the end of ET Adventure. I find it pretty hard to find fault with a more personalized guest experience. Also thought it was pretty rad to load the Disney Magic app while in WDW and find videos of MY actual ToT and Mine Train rides sitting there waiting for me! IMO, they are putting the technology to good use over there despite its initial flaws.

I definitely respect your opinion. The whole personalization thing in general is what feels corporate to me. I don't find things like that appealing at all, moreso extra. Just a personal opinion.
 
D

Deleted member 107043

Funny. I'm pretty sure that most people I talk to would say the very idea of Disneyland is corporate.
 

JoFu

Well-Known Member
AFAIK, the only thing you can use the iPhone's NFC chip is for Apple Pay. I don't think devs have access to it beyond that functionality. :/
That is correct, though I believe Apple will open that up in a future release. That said, Apple Wallet currently supports "loyalty cards" which could easily be used to store an identity and present it to an NFC reader and be used in a way that would very easily work for this or even park entry... I would LOVE to have fully digital park entry and FP, and I would LOVE if that were NFC based and not barcode based.

Editing to add, that you could also use an apple watch in this way and it would be pretty awesome if WDW used a phone based NFC (on iPhone loyalty card like solution) in conjunction with Magic Bands so that on my next trip I could just use my apple watch too.
 
D

Deleted member 107043

So what's the solution for those of us, which is the majority of mobile phone users, who have Android devices?
 

Phroobar

Well-Known Member
NFC has been available in Android phones for a long time. Apple is just late to the party. Disney would need an android app just like the Apple one otherwise they would alienate more than half the mobile phone users in the US. Believe it or not, Apple has a very small percentage of the mobile phone market these days. They are completely unheard of in the rest of the world. World wide Android currently stands at 80.7% of the market while the iPhone has 17.7%.
 

dweezil78

Well-Known Member
Apple just pretends they invented it and it catches on like wild fire.

I don't necessarily think that...but I do think NFC never got mass adoption because Apple took so long to add it to the iPhone -- and still in a format where it's relatively useless outside of Apple Pay.
 

George Lucas on a Bench

Well-Known Member
Just out of curiosity, why do you think it seems corporate? It's more or less a next-gen version of having ET say your name at the end of ET Adventure. I find it pretty hard to find fault with a more personalized guest experience. Also thought it was pretty rad to load the Disney Magic app while in WDW and find videos of MY actual ToT and Mine Train rides sitting there waiting for me! IMO, they are putting the technology to good use over there despite its initial flaws.

Except for the ridiculous CGI cartoon ghosts on screens at the end of Haunted Mansion holding signs.
 

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