VRTP keeping and revealing secrets

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

So discussion has got me thinking:

2 hours ago, djrappa said:

trust me, if something is told to the public, it's 100% expected that it will get out.

We've seen a lot of info come out lately from VRTP under the guise of "secret info" as well as "inadvertent reveals"

Eg:

• Star Tour guests have discussed on here about things they were told, that they were asked not to share.

Remembering of course, that these guests are not asked to sign an NDA, and of course also remember that the most sure fire way to get a rumor spread is to start by telling people 'don't tell anyone, but...'

We've also seen the park do numerous 'inadvertent reveals' :

• DD theming \ characters were "accidentally" left exposed in view of the public. Greg Yong was actually surprised they hadn't been posted on Parkz when commenting to a friend of mine - and sure enough, soon after, they were posted.
• MACK crates appeared on site, right next to public access areas, left in full view of anyone who was interested - and they remained that way for a couple of days after they were delivered, before someone spraypainted over the logos.

It seems to me that VRTP may be doing this intentionally. Leaving info out just long enough to make sure someone got a picture of it, and then "hiding" it to try and make it seem like it's meant to be a secret.

I think @djrappa is on the money here - the parks have kept ride plans secret for a long time in the past, only revealing info when they were ready, and we've long criticised them for that - for not starting the hype train earlier with controlled leaks of information.

Could this be their attempt at doing just that, while making it look like it was just an 'oops' ? By intentionally shutting the gate after it has bolted, it only fuels the fire further - making it look like we found out something we weren't supposed to know...

so - if we see something in park, or are told something in an official capacity (such as Star Tour or UTT) - unless you're signing an NDA - are we really bound to keep anything secret? Should we? Or is that being fed to us as a means to get the info out?

discuss.

 

[Santa07]

You could potentially be right - all these little sneak peeks of things we're getting before they're being covered over could definitely be things to tease us, create hype, and get the attention of the media and/or sites like Parkz.

[New display name]

@AlexB Maybe they didn't want some tool jumping the fence thinking they would end up with a new-

 

[themagician]

I agree Alex. If they really didn't want us to see things they'd cover them up straight away. And if you're theory is correct, good on MW for doing it. I suppose in the past, up until the last couple of years, there were less theme park enthusiasts, there wasn't as much need to tease the way they have been, because people either weren't noticing or not visiting the park as regularly. But with one of us visiting the park nearly every day, we don't really miss anything. Doing these 'sneak peeks' is getting us talking and excited about things happening, and I guess that is what MW would want, unless the info was confidential.

[Reanimated35]

So we should all be free to reveal everything we know, yeah? 

 

All right, everyone start filling us in on Fright Night, the coaster, the opening of the Plaza at sea World, anything new anywhere etc. I know someone out there has to know

[Whombex]

But the flip side of this is if these leaks are innocent and unintentional.

• Tour hosts believing you'll keep secrets
• A truck driver dropping off crates under no instruction to cover them after unloading
• Builders not told to cover up statues

 

Might be way off, maybe playing Devil's advocate, but maybe don't expect everyone to be as diligent as you'd expect. Also, be wary of sharing things you're told, you may lose that person's trust in confiding in you in the future.

Edited September 5, 2016 by Glubbo

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Just as plausible a theory @Glubbo but:

• If a tour host honestly believes everyone in the group will keep it a secret 'just because' without getting people to sign something legally binding - they're an idiot.
• Truck driver might have no obligation, but someone at the park most definitely would have had to sign for them, and if they'd noticed, and cared, they'd have called \ radioed \ walked over to maintenance, told someone to grab some spraypaint and get on it immediately. The pics were up here for almost two days before I heard they'd been painted over.
• I doubt the builders were invovled in the statue thing - i believe they were out for the TVC shoot. If they were that tightly concerned about them being made public, they'd have had someone on scene to ensure it wouldn't happen.

 

As for losing a person's trust - theres a difference. If I was, say - friends with a number of people who work in the park who have had, to some degree, involvement in one or both projects, and they'd in some manner inadvertently or intentionally dropped me a hint - there is no way in hell i'd ever breach that trust by repeating it anywhere.

But if I or a friend of mine with no affiliation with the park happened to walk \ drive past the park and see something left out in the open, or if i were a paying member of the GP who happened to spot something, or hear something in the park said by someone in an official capacity, I wouldn't treat that information in the same way - I would consider it publicly available. Give or take there's been about 50 people through the Star tour by now - no way the park would be able to identify who 'leaked' the info if it were told to every group that attended.

We've even seen them (apparently) engage in mis-information too - every person who attended FN auditions seems to be coming back with a slightly different version of which mazes are expected to be in the park... and that WOULD be an easy way to identify where the leak came from. Especially as so many of them appear to be wrong.

[Richard]

I think the parks are all definitely a bit more clued in these days when it comes to building hype and engaging fans early in the process with teasers, staged leaks etc. Of course the flip-side to that is that they're also now better at keeping things under wraps when they want to, so I wouldn't necessarily proclaim it as a win-win, especially considering that it's not normally official announcements but rather photos and credible rumours that give us most of the important information ahead of a new attraction.

Do we really think that the Mack crates were all part of a grand scheme to quietly leak a bit of information to the more dedicated fans? I think that would be awesome if it were the case... but I think it's much more likely that the creative/marketing/management folks are all up to their elbows in Doomsday and Fright Nights and probably didn't anticipate identifiable parts showing up so early in the piece.

[Theme Park Girl]

I guess with the Star Tour confidentiality situation, obviously yeah, you'd be expected participants to sign an agreement if they wanted absolute sworn secrecy and wanted to legally hold you to it. But on the other hand,  you also just know when you've been told things in good faith not to post it all over the internet, especially when you're a known member on here or other theme park communities/pages. I know I'd personally rather keep the trust factor, it's worth a hell of a lot more to me than a juicy blog headline. 

Also, it's nice to keep some things quiet so that others who are intending to do the tour don't have aspects of it spoilt for them. I know there were a few Easter eggs about a few rides and things I learnt that really surprised and excited me at the time, and I would have been disappointed to learn them in advance. That was one of the reasons I wanted to go to the first one. 

I guess it comes down to personal intuition. You just know when you should or shouldn't be sharing something with others, despite if you've been told you can or not ?

[joz]

It's a real tough one.  Generally speaking if VRTP don't tell people, then we don't tell people.  But there is a point where things aren't a secret anymore if you work in certain industries.  I saw Buzzsaws themeing before it was built because someone who I know who worked in a paint shop sent me the plans.  Someone near where I live told me how much Movie World's coaster is costing because they know one of the builders.  There are often 100s of people involved, from the owners of MACK to the bloke who works as a cleaner at the local wire shop who overheard someone say that they need some wire to fix a machine ASAP because Movie World need it to start building a new coaster.

 

So how long do you keep a secret when you have a website that people come to to find out what's going on before it happens and the secret isn't even that secret anyway?  It's a very fine line, and one I think we do OK at walking.  The other complicating factor is that plans change all the time. if they didn't there'd be a Halfpipe coaster at Sea World, it's amazing how late in the piece plans can change.

 

The MACK logos are an interesting one.  I think it's probably likely that VRTP didn't want us to see that for reasons that one can only guess at.  I don't know if it's for commercial reasons but I hate to break it to you, but Dreamworld already know.  They've known for a long time.  For marketing reasons? Perhaps.  It could be that they want us talking about Doomsday instead of building hype for a ride more than a year away.  Again though, it was a well known thing, and one that only we care about anyway.  For the most part, the public don't know who makes coasters so we're not ruining any major secrets.

 

As for the content of the tour, I think they've made peace with that information being public knowledge.  It'll get out eventually.  I have no doubt that people who have been on the tour have told friends or colleagues without posting it here.  It's a pretty open secret, but Movie World are selling it as part of the tour and we are respecting their wishes by letting them keep selling it.  It's the right thing to do in this instance.  The only downside is it has created a culture of 'Oooh I know something you don't' which does get annoying real fast.  There's an old saying which goes 'Those who know the least know it the loudest'.

[rappa]

Yeah that's my take on it. 

If you know something and want to keep it quiet so other people can share in the excitement of say the tour then that's great.

But at the same time I don't like one person harassing another because they decided to share.

I think there is also a tendency in some cases for some people to play the "I know something but I don't want to break trust" card when in reality it's more a case of them wanting  to possibly seem a bit more special than they actually are, and that I don't like. I really dislike the 'brag factor' I'd guess you'd call it.

 

For me really it sits as, if the information is obtained under commercial confidence or an NDA then of course it should be kept confidential, you'd be insane to risk your job/company/etc on doing otherwise. However if not, through rumor, friends, tours, etc it's kind of fair game and up to the individual what they do with any info they have.

[MaxxTheMonster]

Funnily enough I had to do my annual Privacy and Confidentiality training this morning at work given we have access to so much personal information...  One section says something like...

Would we have been able to access this information of our own either within the public domain or through freely given information from the person...  Is it something that would compromise that persons safety or well being or give cause for any type of discrimination if it were released...

If something is clearly visible by the public in a public area, and cannot be regarded as personal or sensitive information then I don't see why it cannot be revealed...  If it was something said by two employees in a general area which was able to be heard by a passer by and again cannot be regarded as personal or sensitive information...

If you pay to go on a tour which is open to members of the public and information is revealed on the tour and they simply say don't tell anyone...  Anyone from the public can go on the tour so can find out that information so i don't see why it cannot be revealed...

If they really didn't want people to know what statues were going up in Villains area they should have taken greater care as the area is obviously very visible to members of the public...

Same with the Mack boxes...

 

In saying all the above, I would rather find out the information on the tour as part of the tour...  But as also stated earlier, there have been a fair few people to do the tour now so I'm sure word would be getting around of some of the things mentioned...  Even not in these forums...

[bladex]

is it someones fault if mw had mack crates out in the open with mack written on them and they seen them? no it's MW fault for not covering them in the 1st place. they goofed and now the cats out of the bag.

Edited September 5, 2016 by bladex

[Whombex]

20 minutes ago, bladex said:

is it someones fault if mw had mack crates out in the open with mack written on them and they seen them?

Only if VRTP's intention was to have them covered and they weren't through negligence. It's likely they had no idea the crates would be Mack marked, or the receiver had no comprehension of their significance.

[Spotty]

Did anyone actually think that maybe the crates could contain parts for Scooby as its due for a rehab soon? Just a thought 

[Tim Dasco]

1 hour ago, Spotty said:

Did anyone actually think that maybe the crates could contain parts for Scooby as its due for a rehab soon? Just a thought 

Yeah but if they were parts for SDSC why would they put them in a construction zone outside of the park. Instead they would send them to near the SDSC ride or the maintenance shops.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

3 hours ago, Tim Dasco said:

Yeah but if they were parts for SDSC why would they put them in a construction zone outside of the park. Instead they would send them to near the SDSC ride or the maintenance shops.

What you say sounds logical, and of course that is what they would do, but the park has been dropping hints - leaving a red herring out to fool people would have been genius.

[themagician]

SDSC is only closed for maintenance for 3  weeks, so I don't think it's getting a refurb. Just a general maintenance period.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

replacement parts are always needed for general maintenance. Its still technically possible - however unlikely we've already ruled it out to be - it could well have been the case.

As I understand it - the crates we have seen did not come straight off a boat\plane either. I believe they were already on site at MW and were MOVED to that location afterwards... so someone at the park made the decision to put them there... was it intentional? were they just making space without realising the boxes had stencilling on them?

I mean lets be real - we know the contents of those are damn heavy. And there's no urgency to them - they can be shipped well in advance rather than being flown... and if they were shipped - they'd have been in shipping containers - like everything else we usually see arrive on site...

[Tim Dasco]

I would think that maybe the shipping containers were in the area where DD's ride parts were stored. Making us not release they were their. Now that DD ride is finished they moved them to the site. But sometimes when there in crates they don't get put in sea containers but they use the crate as a pallet. When I buy magic props they ship in crates buy boat not in shipping containers.

Edited September 13, 2016 by Tim Dasco

[joz]

As plausible as it sounds that Movie World had a heap of coaster parts for Scooby in tech services, then instead of moving them to Scooby, they moved them to by the side of the road for no good reason, I don't think we should dismiss the idea that they are building a MACK coaster.  

[Theme Park Girl]

16 hours ago, joz said:

As plausible as it sounds that Movie World had a heap of coaster parts for Scooby in tech services, then instead of moving them to Scooby, they moved them to by the side of the road for no good reason

Lol. That's the first thing hubby suggested when the crates were discovered. Maybe we are all excited over what it realistically just new parts for Scooby Doo, since it's annual maintenance period is coming up soon ??

[New display name]

#Box-X-Files  

 

Where are the missing boxes?

[Reanimated35]

Whoever wen to the effort of neatly stacking them and keeping them reasonably in line, did an absolutely terrible job of keeping them in order. 

[New display name]

Ich besorge das Bier