Uni Locks Away Patent for Rainy Day

[awilliams4]

Did the Key to the World really lay a new foundation for the future of Walt Disney World? Very little of the components in MyMagic+ are new or unique and in order to remain a strong foundation will need the proper ongoing maintenance and upgrades such a system will require. Revenue generation was also promised in the short term, not the long term.


Disney has publicly admitted in their earnings calls that MyMagic+ is behind schedule. It was all supposed to have been rolled out by now.

At this rate it will be fully deployed within weeks. Your description of the situation seems negatively
exaggerated. Most all of the E-Tickets and WDW must be failures too. MK is a failure, so is Disneyland. They all opened late and cost more than initially planned.

 

[awilliams4]

The problem with this thread is that it just doesn't make any sense to all the FP+ haters. There are hundreds of posts on this board of haters threatening to not go back to WDW and to go to UNI instead.

Well, I guess you guys can all just stay home now.

 

[lazyboy97o]

At this rate it will be fully deployed within weeks. Your description of the situation seems negatively
exaggerated. Most all of the E-Tickets and WDW must be failures too. MK is a failure, so is Disneyland. They all opened late and cost more than initially planned.

What is exaggerated? Investors were told this billion dollar plus project would be up, running and making money by now. Disneyland and Magic Kingdom both started making money as or better than expected. Euro Disney was deemed a failure because it did not. E-Tickets have been avoided in recent years due to their high cost and the lack of direct revenue compounded by increased internal competition.

 

[pheneix]

They filed these patents in June 2012?

Looks like they wanted to have what they perceived to be an "ace" up their sleeve in case MM+ actually took off.

And so they have it. And they have new rides. And they still spent less money.

 

[xdan0920]

Looks like they weren't much of an insider....as I always suspected anyway.

Not sure who you are referring to here, want to be a little more clear?

 

[awilliams4]

What is exaggerated? Investors were told this billion dollar plus project would be up, running and making money by now. Disneyland and Magic Kingdom both started making money as or better than expected. Euro Disney was deemed a failure because it did not. E-Tickets have been avoided in recent years due to their high cost and the lack of direct revenue compounded by increased internal competition.

Easy, you called it a failure. It isn't even rolled out yet. Your opinion is obviously biased as if you are rooting for it to fail.

'Failure is the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective, and may be viewed as the opposite of success.'

 

[DTale]

I'm not quite sure why people continuously believe this and MyMagic+ are a "violation of privacy." Your on their property, and they want to know what you're doing and where you are on their property. It's not like there's a micro camera that watching you pee everytime you go to the bathroom...

Come on people, technology like this is the future, get over it.

 

[awilliams4]

Not sure who you are referring to here, want to be a little more clear?

There are way too many of these so called insiders that have insisted that MM+ is a, will be a, failure. No one besides those that are knee deep in this have a clue as to how successful this will or will not end up being. These same insiders have also insisted that UNI knows what they are doing. Well, if UNI is copying WDW as they always have, then they are either Bi-Polar or have some sort of other emotional issue.

 

[xdan0920]

There are way too many of these so called insiders that have insisted that MM+ is a, will be a, failure. No one besides those that are knee deep in this have a clue as to how successful this will or will not end up being. These same insiders have also insisted that UNI knows what they are doing. Well, if UNI is copying WDW as they always have, then they are either Bi-Polar or have some sort of other emotional issue.

So, who? There are only a handful of insiders here, which one/s are you claiming is a fraud?

 

[lazyboy97o]

Easy, you called it a failure. It isn't even rolled out yet. Your opinion is obviously biased as if you are rooting for it to fail.

'Failure is the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective, and may be viewed as the opposite of success.'

It was supposed to be completely rolled out by now making money, cost far less and include components that have at the least been out on hold (interactive queues and ride elements). How are any of those desired objectives met?

 

[awilliams4]

It was supposed to be completely rolled out by now making money, cost far less and include components that have at the least been out on hold (interactive queues and ride elements). How are any of those desired objectives met?

I'm wrong. Your right. Like I said (and so did you) Disneyland and Disney World are failures.

They started making money way later than predicted and they had huge cost overruns. I bet that the overruns were much much larger than MM+ too! So Disney Parks have failed for decades.

Happy?

 

[sshindel]

As has been mentioned, just because a patent is filed doesn't mean that it'll be implemented. They may be just getting their proverbial ducks in a row for if (and IMO when) a system like this proves itself to be the game changer it was meant to be.
Uni will have a system like this someday. They will have to in order to keep up. To say that they'll spend less money at this point, since we have no idea if they are actually going to implement everything in the patent, the state of their underlying technological infrastructure, and the million other factors is a little premature. Maybe they will spend less, and maybe it'll be because their systems were in better shape, or the scope of the project will be much smaller either in offerings, or due to the fact that their facilities are a large order of magnitude smaller than WDWs.
Yes, UNI is spending money to offer new rides and experiences right now because it HAD to to make a dent in WDW's dominance. It will have to add a system like this in order to keep up as well. As a consumer, I hope that WDW will use the money it spent to improve it's infrastructure (technological, transportation, resort room capacity, etc) and then make additions to the parks to take advantage of those improvements. I also hope Uni keeps improving it's parks so that I'll feel it in my families interest to visit their parks as well. Based on their current offerings, and my current family situations, it's not happening again anytime soon, but I can hope that they give me reasons to want to visit.

 

[Queeniediva]

So, I'm reading all of this stuff and I can't help but wonder...Do you think the MM+ and all the RFID is a plot to monitor my credit for subversive government activities? As soon as we wave them in front of the little light up mouse thingy to get in that anyone will be able to find us and pin point our location. I sent a strongly worded letter to the Disney folks in California and no response.

Universal is a horrible theme park. Every time I go there, I feel like I am taking my life into my own hands, much like when I go to the local fair and ride a carnival ride operated by a guy with greasy hair and no teeth...same feeling at Universal...Who cares what they are doing? Of course they are going to try and copy Disney...let's hope Disney never tries to copy them. I've not used the magic band, but I do like my little card that my annual pass is converted to...however, I am not sure that it shortens lines at the main gates....ALSO Fastpass takes away the good old days where every ride (even the lame ones) had a 2 hour wait....Long live Figment!

 

[ford91exploder]

This is because the system is still new and there has to be a sufficient amount of time for data to be secured and anylized. There is no way possible that a new system that is as massive as this is going to work the way you want it to until time has passed and you see where the bugs are. It seems to be that most people are not giving it a chance.

In the customer service industry you have ONE CHANCE to satisfy the customer, The MB has contributed to many ruined vacations (spending hours at GR trying to get the things customers PAID for) and as a knock on effect many cancelled Disney vacations due to experiences with the MB system earlier this year.

As to UNI filing a patent, You might have heard of defensive patents which companies file so in the event they do something another patent lists as one of its claims, You then have a patent which shows you had prior art, or simply use your claims against the other claimant. It protects you the patent holder even if you have no intention of putting your patent to use.

 

[sshindel]

It was supposed to be completely rolled out by now making money, cost far less and include components that have at the least been out on hold (interactive queues and ride elements). How are any of those desired objectives met?

I do agree with you that these objectives have not been met. I do think it's a little short-term thinking in a long-term game.
The budget has been overrun, the initial timelines have been missed. That does not mean it will not be a long-term success. IMO it will. It will change guest behavior. It will make money. It will allow additional features that further enhance the guest experience. It just isn't ready for it yet. So it's been a short-term boondoggle. Hopefully it will remain as that, and historically it will be looked at as being a good product that had a shaky launch.

 

[ScoutN]

They filed these patents in June 2012?

Looks like they wanted to have what they perceived to be an "ace" up their sleeve in case MM+ actually took off.

And so they have it. And they have new rides. And they still spent less money.

Don't you know this thread has gone into twist Uni's actions to justify Disney's?

 

[ScoutN]

As has been mentioned, just because a patent is filed doesn't mean that it'll be implemented.

Yea Disney is sitting on a TON of em! And we got them playing catch up game with free WiFi like all the I95 hotels already have.

 

[ford91exploder]

When MM+ was announced I was VERY excited for the potential use of it. Then they broke FP, and spent those legendary billions trying to fix it. Uni can learn from the mistakes of others and make this actually kick butt.
Though, my money says they patent will never actually be utilized. I'm curious how many patented ideas are ever produced.

Many patents these days are purely defensive, I'm primary inventor on a couple patents and co-inventor on about 4 others. fully half of these are defensive and the other half we will implement.

 

[sshindel]

In the customer service industry you have ONE CHANCE to satisfy the customer, The MB has contributed to many ruined vacations (spending hours at GR trying to get the things customers PAID for) and as a knock on effect many cancelled Disney vacations due to experiences with the MB system earlier this year.

It has also contributed to many enhanced vacations, mine included in that lot. Current reviews on this site show it as rated 4 1/2 out of 5 stars. I know that many people had rough times when using the system during it's (well advertised) test phase. It has seemed to stabilize as the bugs have been worked out, which is exactly what a test phase is for.

 

[ford91exploder]

The problem with this thread is that it just doesn't make any sense to all the FP+ haters. There are hundreds of posts on this board of haters threatening to not go back to WDW and to go to UNI instead.

Well, I guess you guys can all just stay home now.

Actually a good number of us 'haters' are staying home, We liked Walt's view of Disney parks, are not fans of thrill rides and absolutely despise what Iger/Rasulo/Staggs are doing with parks.

So we are staying home and spending money elsewhere but NOT with Disney OR UNI.