This Wonderland Orientation video is awesome to watch. It's stupidly 90s, but its great to see some behind the scenes footage of a park that no longer exists and the expectations they had of their staff.
 

 

I can honestly say I never had to watch that while i worked there. Probably good too. I really gave it a good go but had to stop before the 13th minute.

I like the idea, but sadly the park didn't really exhibit any of those traits in reality. Not to that extent anyway. Looks like this was before Probe, so i'd date it around 1992-1995, and it shows.

I think better actors could have made the concept a reality - instead they have used real cast members, which isn't a bad idea, except when those cast members aren't 'showmen'.

was nice to see the park back in that day though.

21 minutes ago, AlexB said:

I can honestly say I never had to watch that while i worked there. Probably good too. I really gave it a good go but had to stop before the 13th minute.

I like the idea, but sadly the park didn't really exhibit any of those traits in reality. Not to that extent anyway. Looks like this was before Probe, so i'd date it around 1992-1995, and it shows.

I think better actors could have made the concept a reality - instead they have used real cast members, which isn't a bad idea, except when those cast members aren't 'showmen'.

was nice to see the park back in that day though.

The description says it's from 1994, which is before the Sunway buy out. If I may ask, when did you work there? It'd be interesting to see if it was the management that changed how the park portrayed itself. I'm making a video on the rise and fall of Wonderland at the moment and it'd be nice to get some first hand input.

 

38 minutes ago, CaptainLazerGuns said:

The description says it's from 1994, which is before the Sunway buy out. If I may ask, when did you work there? It'd be interesting to see if it was the management that changed how the park portrayed itself. I'm making a video on the rise and fall of Wonderland at the moment and it'd be nice to get some first hand input.

Oh really? Are you doing that for an assignment or just in your spare time? I'd be super keen on checking that out once you get it complete. 

3 minutes ago, Jdude95 said:

 

Oh really? Are you doing that for an assignment or just in your spare time? I'd be super keen on checking that out once you get it complete. 

Just a hobby project for YouTube. I'll post it on here once it's done

58 minutes ago, CaptainLazerGuns said:

The description says it's from 1994, which is before the Sunway buy out. If I may ask, when did you work there? It'd be interesting to see if it was the management that changed how the park portrayed itself. I'm making a video on the rise and fall of Wonderland at the moment and it'd be nice to get some first hand input.

I was definitely cast during the Sunway era, however I grew up not far from the park and visited often. that level of service and 'show' wasn't really applicable even from 1994ish onwards.

You probably could say Sunway had a lot to do with the standard slip, but i think it had slipped prior to their takeover, leaving them with no standards to follow in that regard.

I remember reading online somewhere that Taft broadcasting had the opportunity of selling their stake in Australia's Wonderland to paramount parks who was at the time buying up all of the other parks owned by Taft but instead of selling to paramount they ended up selling their stake to the other investment partners involved with Australia's Wonderland who went on to sell it off to Sunway who in 2002 closed the park while paramount operated Taft's parks till 2006 when they sold the parks they bought from Taft to Cedar Fair who continues to operate all of the parks they acquired.

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by Theme Park

Yes and no. Taft (which owned KECO) was only a minority stakeholder in Wonderland.

Other owners at construction included James Hardie, Leighton Holdings and the NSW State Superannuation Board...

Paramount purchased Taft \ KECO in 1992, but chose not to acquire the Taft\KECO stake in Wonderland as part of the deal. I think the logic behind it was the distance (as all the other KECO parks were in North America).

Sunway didn't acquire Wonderland until 1997 - in the interim, the Taft\KECO share was purchased by a local group of investors - the identity of which I don't know, but I'm fairly certain they were other than the original investment group.

I wish we did though - considering out of the 4 non-opening day attractions, both Demon and Probe were installed at a time when it was all locally owned. Only the Moore Park SkyRider was installed post-sunway, (and Zodiac while it was still KECO).

That said, Probe was an expensive investment at the time, and possibly led to some cash flow issues leading to the sale to sunway - purely speculation, but it makes sense within a year after the ride opened.

1 hour ago, AlexB said:

Yes and no. Taft (which owned KECO) was only a minority stakeholder in Wonderland.

Other owners at construction included James Hardie, Leighton Holdings and the NSW State Superannuation Board...

Paramount purchased Taft \ KECO in 1992, but chose not to acquire the Taft\KECO stake in Wonderland as part of the deal. I think the logic behind it was the distance (as all the other KECO parks were in North America).

Sunway didn't acquire Wonderland until 1997 - in the interim, the Taft\KECO share was purchased by a local group of investors - the identity of which I don't know, but I'm fairly certain they were other than the original investment group.

I wish we did though - considering out of the 4 non-opening day attractions, both Demon and Probe were installed at a time when it was all locally owned. Only the Moore Park SkyRider was installed post-sunway, (and Zodiac while it was still KECO).

That said, Probe was an expensive investment at the time, and possibly led to some cash flow issues leading to the sale to sunway - purely speculation, but it makes sense within a year after the ride opened.

Wow AlexB thanks for the detailed feedback on my post who would have thought that a 200ft drop tower called space probe could hurt their financial situation so badly.

I swear that @Theme Park is some sort of experimental AI.

20 minutes ago, joz said:

I swear that @Theme Park is some sort of experimental AI.

What makes you say that

13 minutes ago, Theme Park said:

What makes you say that

Does a set of all sets contain itself?

12 minutes ago, Reanimated35 said:

Does a set of all sets contain itself?

Is this just a reference to russels paradox.

Edited October 12, 20178 yr by Theme Park

@joz I'm pretty sure you're right. 

I'm just amazed this is someone's all time favourite theme park video/photo/article.

4 minutes ago, Roachie said:

I'm just amazed this is someone's all time favourite theme park video/photo/article.

Remember that's based on audience level and opinion. Many of my friends in Sydney had never been to another park besides Wonderland and thought it was the bees knees. For wonderland fanatics, the behind the scenes aspect to the video is awesome.

 

For more worldly travellers, it's quite cringeworthy, but you only know what you know.

I was extremely young when I visited Wonderland, so I feel the majority of the video is based around the nostalgia of seeing the park.

It's probably not my all time favourite, just thought it was awesome to actually see the park again.

On 10/12/2017 at 4:30 PM, AlexB said:

I wish we did though - considering out of the 4 non-opening day attractions, both Demon and Probe were installed at a time when it was all locally owned. 

That said, Probe was an expensive investment at the time, and possibly led to some cash flow issues leading to the sale to sunway - purely speculation, but it makes sense within a year after the ride opened.

If Paramount bought Wonderland, I can tell you there would have been an open possibility Sydney would have become the theme park capital of Australia, and not the Gold Coast. In 1992, the Gold Coast was still making a name for itself, Movie World had just opened, Dreamworld hadn't installed any of their Big 9 at the time, and Sea World - was actually pretty good, it had Lasseter's, Corkscrew and Vikings Revenge back then.

Paramount invested heavily in the 10+ years that they owned the KECO parks, in order to make their own version of Six Flags. Whether or not our Wonderland could have gotten a slice of the pie is anyone's guess.

But, judging by the rides that Paramount added to their parks, we could have gotten some seriously good attractions. Who knows, we could have gotten a Drop Zone tower (we did ultimately get one in the form of Space Probe), a Top Gun inverted coaster or a Backlot clone.

Edited October 13, 20178 yr by XxMrYoshixX

On 12/10/2017 at 2:44 PM, Jdude95 said:

 

Oh really? Are you doing that for an assignment or just in your spare time? I'd be super keen on checking that out once you get it complete. 

Hey mate, just uploaded the video. Feel free to give it a watch:
 

 

This video bought back so many memories.  

I wasn't expecting such a great quality video. This was super interesting and informative. I hope you do make more like this in the future as I would watch the hell out of them. 

10 hours ago, CaptainLazerGuns said:

Hey mate, just uploaded the video. Feel free to give it a watch:

That's a great way to get off on the right foot.

You've used a lot of material without permission, including some of my photos. Although you give credit on your channel to wonderland history, you haven't approached them for permission either.

 

1 minute ago, AlexB said:

That's a great way to get off on the right foot.

You've used a lot of material without permission, including some of my photos. Although you give credit on your channel to wonderland history, you haven't approached them for permission either.

 

I'm happy to follow this up with you personally. Send me a private message.

I want to make sure that all creators are properly acknowledged and credited for their works. 

Then you have the due diligence to seek permission prior to producing and publishing.

The sites you've pulled the content from are not hard to contact and have a very public presence. It should not be up to them to reach out to you to raise the issue when its clear you've ripped the material. I know for a fact it wouldn't have taken much for you to reach out to the WonderlandHistory team, and they'd probably have been really supportive, including offering original footage rather than compressed youtube material.

I'm not going to bother with private messaging you as you've clearly shown a preference to ask forgiveness rather than permission, and in the process expected ME to chase you up about it.

The guys at Wonderland History have already flagged the video with YouTube's content management, so I suggest those who want to watch it do so quickly.

1 hour ago, AlexB said:

The guys at Wonderland History have already flagged the video with YouTube's content management, so I suggest those who want to watch it do so quickly.

Cheers for the response. I'll be sure to take in mind moving forward. 

As per the flag, I'll be surprised if it stands. I can sense your hostility towards this issue and as a creator I completely respect it, but please don't try to scare me. Copyright Act 1968 s41 & s42 covers fair dealings in relation to videos which are "Reporting the news" on current or historic events, and review and criticism. Also with the video being hosted on a public US platform it also falls under Section 107 of the US Copyright Act which covers news reporting. 

I'll be happy to re-upload the video with absolutely no mention of yourself or WonderlandHistory.net and using neither of your content if you're so inclined. 

Edited October 15, 20178 yr by CaptainLazerGuns