Originally Posted By disneywatcher >> I'll wait for the Reader's Digest version. << LOL. However, Doobie should be proud that his Disney community boards attract the most committed, prolific message writers who are interested in "Disney" and the DisCo. For lengthy, serious debate, no other Internet board that I've seen so far comes close. If anyone at the DisCo. even bothers to read public musings about various aspects of their operations -- their theme parks in particular -- I would think they'd peruse LP.com more frequently, because it is sort of a Disney-topic version of the letters/opinion pages of The New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
Originally Posted By woody >> But this demand by various people online here that they be perfect in everything they do is completely unrealistic, and is an offshoot of a nearly total lack of knowledge or understanding of corporate history. >> Viewing events at Disney in a vacuum, as if they do not exist in reference to other current economic and sociological references is not a worthwhile exercise, and has little value. It's senseless to think they can exist on a separate plane of reality from everything else in the world, and by repeatedly only talking towards specific Disney facts and not relating them to other associated issues, people do exactly that. Are we to acknowledge corporate history only to ignore it later on? >>Of course they're not perfect, and no one says they are. No one says DCA is without faults, for example, or that anything else they do is without fault. >>As far as Jim Hill's column goes while I respect Jim Hill and his abilities and knowledge, he quite often takes an overly negative approach to facts that I feel are just not fully merited. So Disney is never perfect, but somehow Jim Hill is supposed to be? reddon wrote: >>Post and let post, respect other's opinion. I won't question this statement.
Originally Posted By jonvn "You better look into your own posts and take out those cheap shots sling at other people before you accuse me or anyone else." Oh, I'm sorry. Was there something I missed in the nasty comment about you needing to clarify your comments for me? You mean to say you didn't intend on being nasty? I'm so sorry, then. I just read into your comment an implication that because I didn't answer you, I somehow did not understand what you said, and therefore was mentally incapable of reading the simple english statements you were making. Gee. How wrong I was, eh? In a further attempt at being polite, I'll answer your questions: "But is this a sure thing that things will get better? How do we know if it won't get worse? Can you foresee the future? " How do you know they WON'T? What makes you think that all of a sudden they are not going to do the things they have been doing all along? What do you think the accelerated additions to DCA are about? You don't have to look into the future. You can see right now that what they are doing with DCA is immediately trying to address customer comments. What is being unrealistic and ignoring the blatant facts of the matter is that they ALREADY are doing things. "How many corporations made the wrong decision and never recover?" This is one reason why diversification is good. You can make a wrong decision in one area, and have cushion to survive it in others. But what exactly is their "wrong decision" that can not be corrected or recovered from? "Time will tell, not jonvn will tell." Yeah, you're right. I'm only here telling you what's already happening, and how it is an indication of what has always gone on in the past. For those who don't want to hear it, I'm sure it's not good to hear. "Don’t force your opinion on others and writing post like you possess the one and only truth, telling people that they are not acknowledging the “facts”. " The issue here is whether or not you actually understand what a fact or an opinion really is. The FACT is that they are making hundreds of millions in improvements to DCA, for example, and have been adding stuff all along. Now you can ignore this FACT, because it may be beneficial to your argument that I'm some sort of lowlife, but that IS what is happening. The fact that you do not wish to acknowledge or understand it notwithstanding. "Post and let post, respect other's opinion." Then I suggest you allow me to do the same, or is there one set of rules for me, and another set of rules for those who happen to agree with you? "So Disney is never perfect, but somehow Jim Hill is supposed to be?" I never said nor implied any such thing.
Originally Posted By Fairest of Them All >>"The topics are all messed up....." Well, I clarify my points for you in post 107. Any more clarification that you think you might need?<< Wow. When I read that post by jonvn I interpreted completely differently. While you, reddon, saw that and thought it meant the posts were off topic, I read it and thought he was just noting the fact that there have been a few glitches as far as numbering the topics and so forth. Very interesting how different people view the fence and what's it's there for based on where they are standing...
Originally Posted By jonvn "When I read that post by jonvn I interpreted completely differently. While you, reddon, saw that and thought it meant the posts were off topic, I read it and thought he was just noting the fact that there have been a few glitches as far as numbering the topics and so forth." That is, of course, exactly what I meant and it was put here because it took several posts in order to get this particular one unstuck.
Originally Posted By KanakiKid DouglasDubh: "There's a great deal of precedence that things will get better. There's little precedence that things will get worse." Where's your evidence, Doug? Even before Sept.11th, things for Disney didn't look too rosy. Aftwards, things look very bad. In the news is that "WWTBAMillionare" could possibly not be coming back a year from now. Also ABC in general came in FOURTH place in the Nov. ratings. With ABC, Disney had one spectacular hit, but they overused it, until it became a parody of itself and folks are tuning away to the FOX network instead. In the meantime, Disney/ABC hasn't capitalize on their good fortune by creating "spin-offs" of "Millionare" or use it to spark interest in sitcoms or dramas. Disney got caught in the down ward curve of the Dot Com industry and lost $$$$$$. The film division, except for "Monsters Inc." has not been an overwhelming success. Even with "Monsters" they have to share profits with Pixar. Remember Pearl Harbor? It really didn't do bad at the box office, but with Eisner's touting it as a mega hit and all of the publicity that Disney lavished on it fell way short of the "hit" it was supposed to be. The only bright spot was the theme parks division. It's been used as the cash engine that pulled the underperforming divisions out of the red. With the opening of DCA to less than expected numbers opened it to press criticism. Compound that with Sept. 11th and both Disney resorts did either terrible (WDW) or less than expected (DLR). To say that "There's little precedence that things will get worse." is overly optimistic. Maybe the old saying goes: " when you're down so low; everything else HAS to be UP" applies now for Disney. We skeptics aren't making up these problems, nor are some of these examples "nitpicking" they are real and very serious. I'd really hate to read a headline in the near future announcing the opening of news additons to the Six Flags Corp. chain of parks--Six Flags Disneyland, Six Flags California Adventure, Six Flags Magic Kingdom, etc.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh "Where's your evidence, Doug?" Do you really expect me to recount over 60 years of Disney history? The examples you give go back one, maybe two years. Disney movies have had slumps before, and rebounded. Disney theme parks have had slumps before, and rebounded. ABC has been last in the ratings before, and rebounded. None of the things you've listed were an overwhelming catastrophe, and during the last few years, Disney has had some successes as well.
Originally Posted By KanakiKid "Disney movies have had slumps before, and rebounded. Disney theme parks have had slumps before, and rebounded. ABC has been last in the ratings before, and rebounded. " Yeah, but now Disney has about $15 billion in debt in a recessionary economy. ". . .Disney has had some successes as well." For instance? One brightspot is the licensing agreement with the OLC. Too bad, Disney didn't offer to pay for TDS, instead of purchasing Fox's Kid's cable channel. They could have had a real successful park on their hands.
Originally Posted By AgentLaRue ". . .Disney has had some successes as well." For instance?" Are we saying Disney has had no successes company-wide in the last few years? For movies, Spy Kids, Toy Story 2 and Monsters, Inc. have performed extremely well. I don't have time to look up the performance of all the others, but these are some good examples of successes. Television, Millionaire was a stunning success, succeeding well beyond what anyone expected. Maybe succeeding too much, such that it has been overused. I believe ABC News is now the top rated network. I'm no t.v. buff, so I'll leave the rest to others. Theme parks: Believe is nice, HM makeover has been well received, DTD is doing well, Grand Californian is performing nicely, etc. I have no problem if you feel that Disney's efforts overall have not been great the last few years, but there certainly have been successes among the efforts.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh "Yeah, but now Disney has about $15 billion in debt in a recessionary economy." I'm no Wall Street genius and haven't been keeping that close an eye on it, but I haven't seen anything to indicate that Disney's debt, whatever it is, is extraordinary or unmanageable. Sometimes going a little into debt is the smart move. Agent LaRue took care of most of the "for instances". If you really need some more, let me know.
Originally Posted By WrongWay KanakiKid, Post 127 does a pretty good job of listing a lot of problems with the company. One primary one you left off is that the company is now $15 billion in debt and having its bond ratings droped so that borrowing any more money will be a lot more expensive. "I'd really hate to read a headline in the near future announcing the opening of news additons to the Six Flags Corp. chain of parks--Six Flags Disneyland, Six Flags California Adventure, Six Flags Magic Kingdom, etc." This is VERY unlikely to happen as Six Flags (symbol PKS from the days when they were Premier Parks before they bought Six Flags from WB for $2 billion), is over $2 billion in debt from the purchase of the Six Flags chain from WB. They are having a lot of trouble pulling in the revenue they expected. As a result, they too are having negative profits and poor debt rating. In fact, they are getting more negative. In the first 3/4 of this year, they have lost $.26 a share more than at this point last year. They lost $.30 more last year than they lost in Fy 1998. I think their problem is that they've tought their customers to expect a new Bigger/Faster/More Extreme coaster every 2 years. Now, they either have to keep up the construction rate, or they will lose a big chunk of their attendance. See guys, Disney isn't the only company I say bad things about.
Originally Posted By WrongWay "I haven't seen anything to indicate that Disney's debt, whatever it is, is extraordinary or unmanageable." Check out this story: <a href="http://www.mouseinfo.com/news/story.php?id=75" target="_blank">http://www.mouseinfo.com/news/ story.php?id=75</a> It talks about how several leading bond raters have droped Disney's becasue they are getting too much debt. It also highlights how DIsney has a plan to get back out of debt, biut that is totally dependant on the earning loss turning back into a gain by FY 2003 (which starts ten months from now). John, sorry if you are offended by my again using the fact that they lost money last year. If you still ave a problem with this, we should probably start a new thread for that.
Originally Posted By jonvn I'm not the least bit offended if they lost money. But, they didn't. They have a P/E, and they just announced a dividend. This stuff is easily found on various websites. Some of them have been shown to you here, of which your reply, in one instance was "bla bla bla." So, anyway, while you personally have your own method for accounting, I think I'll just stick with the accepted methods that everyone else uses. For the rest of us, we'll just make do with facts and reality. So long.
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Originally Posted By JeffG >> "Just like you said people can say they like DCA without being labeled as shill for Disney or DCA apologizer. I agree 100%. But it goes both ways, people can criticize Disney without being labeled as unrealistic or other names. " << You really don't see a difference between the examples you are citing here? When someone is accused of being a "shill for Disney", the accuser is making a suggestion of dishonesty. They are accusing someone of posting based an undisclosed affiliation instead of naturally developed opinions. I don't have as big a problem with "apologist", although it does beg the question of what the person is supposedly apologizing for. It isn't a particularly meaningful way to respond to an expressed opinion. It seems clear to me, though, that "unrealistic" is a totally different example. That is a fairly descriptive way of characterizing an opinion. Unlike the other examples, someone who's opinions are being called unrealistic can certainly counter the argument with something other than a denial. In a nutshell, I see "unrealistic" as a term that describes someone's opinions while the other examples you cited focus more on someone's motivations. The latter is both much harder to defend against and more of a personal attack. -Jeff
