Coordinates | 38°53′51.61″N77°2′11.58″N |
---|---|
company name | The Walt Disney Company |
company logo | |
company type | Public company |
traded as | Dow Jones Industrial Average Component |
foundation | Los Angeles, California, U.S.(October 16, 1923) |
founder | Walt and Roy Disney |
location city | Burbank, California, U.S. |
Area served | Worldwide |
key people | Robert Iger()John E. Pepper, Jr. () |
industry | Media conglomerate |
revenue | US$ 38.063 billion (FY 2010) |
operating income | US$ 6.627 billion (FY 2010) |
net income | US$ 4.313 billion (FY 2010) |
assets | US$ 69.206 billion (FY 2010) |
equity | US$ 39.342 billion (FY 2010) |
num employees | 149,000 (FY 2010) |
divisions | |
subsid | |
homepage | Disney.com }} |
The Walt Disney Company () (commonly referred to as Disney) is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio the company was reincorporated as Walt Disney Productions, Ltd. in 1929, and became publicly-traded as Walt Disney Productions in 1938. Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into live-action film production, television, and travel. Taking on its current name in 1986, The Walt Disney Company expanded its existing operations and also started divisions focused upon theatre, radio, publishing, and online media. In addition, it has created new divisions of the company in order to market more mature content than it typically associates with its flagship family-oriented brands.
The company is best known for the products of its film studio, the Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group, and today one of the largest and best-known studios in Hollywood. Disney also owns and operates the ABC broadcast television network; cable television networks such as Disney Channel, ESPN, and ABC Family; publishing, merchandising, and theatre divisions; and owns and licenses 14 theme parks around the world. The company has been a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average since May 6, 1991. An early and well-known cartoon creation of the company, Mickey Mouse, is the official mascot of The Walt Disney Company.
After the demise of the ''Alice'' comedies, Disney developed an all-cartoon series starring his first original character, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, which was distributed by Winkler Pictures through Universal Pictures. Disney only completed 26 ''Oswald'' shorts before losing the contract in February 1928, when Winkler's husband Charles Mintz took over their distribution company. Mintz hired away all of Disney's animators except Ub Iwerks to start his own animation studio.
Disney continued to produce cartoons with Mickey Mouse and other characters, and began the Silly Symphonies series, which was advertised as "Mickey Mouse Presents a Walt Disney Silly Symphony". In 1932, Disney signed an exclusive contract with Technicolor (through the end of 1935) to produce cartoons in color, beginning with ''Flowers and Trees'' (1932). Disney released cartoons through Powers' Celebrity Pictures (1928–1930), Columbia Pictures (1930–1932), and United Artists (1932–1937). The popularity of the Mickey Mouse series and the Silly Symphony series allowed Disney to plan for his first feature-length animation.
Using the profits from ''Snow White'', Disney financed the construction of a new studio complex in Burbank, California. The new Walt Disney Studios, in which the company is headquartered to this day, was completed and open for business by the end of 1939. The following year, Walt Disney Productions had its initial public offering.
The studio continued releasing animated shorts and features, such as ''Pinocchio'' (1940), ''Fantasia'' (1940), ''Dumbo'' (1941), and ''Bambi'' (1942). With the onset of World War II, box-office profits began to dry up. When the United States entered the war after the attack on Pearl Harbor, many of Disney's animators were drafted into the armed forces, and the studio itself was temporarily commandeered by the U.S. military. The U.S. government commissioned the studio to produce training and propaganda films, which provided Disney with needed funds. Films such as the feature ''Victory Through Air Power'' and the short ''Education for Death'' (both 1943) were meant to galvanize public support for the war effort. Even the studio's characters joined the effort, as Donald Duck appeared in a number of comical propaganda shorts, including the Academy Award-winning ''Der Fuehrer's Face'' (1943).
The release of ''Cinderella'' in 1950 proved that feature-length animation could still succeed in the marketplace. Other releases of the period included ''Alice in Wonderland'' (1951) and ''Peter Pan'' (1953), both in production before the war began, and Disney's first all-live action feature, ''Treasure Island'' (1950). Other early all-live-action Disney films included ''The Story of Robin Hood and His Merrie Men'' (1952),''The Sword and the Rose'' (1953), and ''20,000 Leagues Under the Sea'' (1954). Disney ended its distribution contract with RKO in 1953, forming its own distribution arm, Buena Vista Distribution.
In December 1950, Walt Disney Productions and The Coca-Cola Company teamed up for Disney's first venture into television, the NBC television network special ''An Hour in Wonderland''. In October 1954, the ABC network launched Disney's first regular television series, ''Disneyland'', which would go on to become one of the longest-running primetime series of all time. ''Disneyland'' allowed Disney a platform to introduce new projects and broadcast older ones, and ABC became Disney's partner in the financing and development of Disney's next venture, located in the middle of an orange grove near Anaheim, California.
For the 1964 New York World's Fair, Disney prepared four separate attractions for various sponsors, each of which would find its way to Disneyland in one form or another. During this time, Walt Disney was also secretly scouting out new sites for a second Disney theme park. In November 1955, "Disney Planet" was announced, with plans for theme parks, hotels, and even a model city on thousands of acres of land purchased outside of Orlando, Florida.
Disney continued to focus its talents on television throughout the 1950s. Its weekday afternoon children's television program ''The Mickey Mouse Club'', featuring its roster of young "Mouseketeers", premiered in 1955 to great success, as did the ''Davy Crockett'' miniseries, starring Fess Parker and broadcast on the ''Disneyland'' anthology show. Two years later, the ''Zorro'' series would prove just as popular, running for two seasons on ABC, as well as separate episodes on the ''Disneyland'' series. Despite such success, Walt Disney Productions invested little into television ventures in the 1960s, with the exception of the long-running anthology series, later known as ''The Wonderful World of Disney''.
Disney's film studios stayed busy as well, averaging five or six releases per year during this period. While the production of shorts slowed significantly during the 1950s and 1960s, the studio released a number of popular animated features, like ''Lady and the Tramp'' (1955), ''Sleeping Beauty'' (1959) and ''One Hundred and One Dalmatians'' (1961), which introduced a new xerography process to transfer the drawings to animation cels. Disney's live-action releases were spread across a number of genres, including historical fiction (''Johnny Tremain'', 1957), adaptations of children's books (''Pollyanna'', 1960) and modern-day comedies (''The Shaggy Dog'', 1959). Disney's most successful film of the 1960s was a live action/animated musical adaptation of ''Mary Poppins'', which received five Academy Awards, including Best Actress Julie Andrews.
In 1967, the last two films Walt actively followed were released: the animated feature ''The Jungle Book'' and the musical ''The Happiest Millionaire''. The studio released a number of comedies in the late 1960s, including ''The Love Bug'' (1968) and ''The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes'' (1969), which starred another young Disney discovery, Kurt Russell. The 1970s opened with the release of Disney's first "post-Walt" animated feature, ''The Aristocats'', followed by a return to fantasy musicals in 1971's ''Bedknobs and Broomsticks''.
On October 1, 1971, Walt Disney World opened to the public, with Roy Disney dedicating the facility in person later that month. Two months later, on December 20, 1971, Roy Disney died of a stroke, leaving the company under control of Donn Tatum, Card Walker, and Walt's son-in-law Ron Miller, each trained by Walt and Roy.
Inspired by the popularity of ''Star Wars'', the Disney studio produced the science-fiction adventure ''The Black Hole'' in 1979.''The Black Hole'' was one of the first Disney releases to carry a PG rating, the first being ''Take Down'', also released in 1979. In 1980, Disney has joined venture with Paramount Pictures on the production of the 1980 film adaptation of Popeye, which was a critical failure, yet a moderate box office success. Disney joined with Paramount again in the 1981 fantasy epic Dragonslayer, which was more mature than anything Disney was ever involved with at the time, though it was a box office failure. The releases of these and other PG-rated Disney films such as the boldly innovative ''Tron'' (1982) led Disney CEO Ron Miller to create Touchstone Pictures as a brand for Disney to release more adult-oriented material. Touchstone's first release was the comedy ''Splash'' (1984), which was a box office success.
With ''The Wonderful World of Disney'' remaining a prime-time staple, Disney returned to television in the 1970s with syndicated programing such as the anthology series ''The Mouse Factory'' and a brief revival of the ''Mickey Mouse Club''. In 1980, Disney launched Walt Disney Home Video to take advantage of the newly-emerging videocassette market. On April 18, 1983, The Disney Channel debuted as a subscription-level channel on cable systems nationwide, featuring its large library of classic films and TV series, along with original programming and family-friendly third-party offerings.
Walt Disney World received much of the company's attention through the 1970s and into the 1980s. In 1978, Disney executives announced plans for the second Walt Disney World theme park, EPCOT Center, which would open in October 1982. Inspired by Walt Disney's dream of a futuristic model city, EPCOT Center was built as a "permanent World's Fair", complete with exhibits sponsored by major American corporations, as well as pavilions based on the cultures of other nations. In Japan, the Oriental Land Company partnered with Walt Disney Productions to build the first Disney theme park outside of the United States, Tokyo Disneyland, which opened in April 1983.
Despite the success of the Disney Channel and its new theme park creations, Walt Disney Productions was financially vulnerable. Its film library was valuable, but offered few current successes, and its leadership team was unable to keep up with other studios, particularly the works of Don Bluth, who defected from Disney in 1979. In 1984, financier Saul Steinberg launched a hostile takeover bid for Walt Disney Productions, with the intent of selling off its various assets. Disney successfully fought off the bid with the help of friendly investors, and Sid Bass and Roy Disney's son Roy Edward Disney brought in Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg from Paramount Pictures and Frank Wells from Warner Bros. to head up the company.
During the second half of the 1980s and early 1990s, Disney revitalized. Beginning with ''Who Framed Roger Rabbit'' (1988), and later, ''The Little Mermaid'' (1989), its flagship animation studio enjoyed a series of commercial and critical successes. In addition, the company successfully entered the field of television animation with a number of lavishly budgeted and acclaimed series such as ''Adventures of the Gummi Bears'', ''Duck Tales'' and ''Gargoyles'', which were credited in raising artistic standards for the medium in general. Disney also broadened its adult offerings in film when then Disney Studio Chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg acquired Miramax Films in 1993. Disney acquired many other media sources during the decade, including a merger with Capital Cities/ABC in 1996 which brought broadcast network ABC and its assets, including the ESPN networks, into the Disney fold.
During the early part of the 1990s, Eisner and his partners set out to plan "The Disney Decade" which was to feature new parks around the world, existing park expansions, new films, and new media investments. While some of the proposals did follow through, most did not. These included the ''Euro Disney Resort'' (now Disneyland Paris), ''Disney-MGM Studios'' (now Disney's Hollywood Studios), Disney's California Adventure Park, ''Disney-MGM Studios Paris'' (eventually opened in 2002 as Walt Disney Studios Park), and various film projects including a ''Who Framed Roger Rabbit'' franchise.
Wells died in a helicopter crash in 1994 (''The Lion King'', which went on to become the most successful hand-drawn animated picture of all time, was dedicated to his memory). Shortly thereafter, Katzenberg resigned and formed Dreamworks SKG with partners Steven Spielberg and David Geffen because Eisner would not appoint Katzenberg to Wells' now-available post. Instead, Eisner recruited his friend Michael Ovitz, one of the founders of the Creative Artists Agency, to be President, with minimal involvement from Disney's board of directors (which at the time included Oscar-winning actor Sidney Poitier, the CEO of Hilton Hotels Corporation Stephen Bollenbach, former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, Yale dean Robert A. M. Stern, and Eisner's predecessors Raymond Watson and Card Walker). Ovitz lasted only 14 months and left Disney in December 1996 via a "no fault termination" with a severance package of $38 million in cash and 3 million stock options worth roughly $100 million at the time of Ovitz's departure. The Ovitz episode engendered a long running derivative suit, which finally concluded in June 2006, almost 10 years later. Chancellor William B. Chandler, III of the Delaware Court of Chancery, despite describing Eisner's behavior as falling "far short of what shareholders expect and demand from those entrusted with a fiduciary position..." found in favor of Eisner and the rest of the Disney board because they hadn't violated the letter of the law (namely, the duty of care owed by a corporation's officers and board to its shareholders).
On March 3, 2004, at Disney's annual shareholders' meeting, a surprising and unprecedented 43% of Disney's shareholders, predominantly rallied by former board members Roy Disney and Stanley Gold, withheld their proxies to re-elect Eisner to the board. Disney's board then gave the chairmanship position to Mitchell. However, the board did not immediately remove Eisner as chief executive.
On March 13, 2005, Eisner announced that he would step down as CEO one year before his contract expired. On September 30, Eisner resigned both as an executive and as a member of the board of directors, and, severing all formal ties with the company, he waived his contractual rights to perks such as the use of a corporate jet and an office at the company's Burbank headquarters. Eisner's replacement was his longtime assistant, Robert Iger.
Aware that Disney's relationship with Pixar was wearing thin, President and CEO Robert Iger began negotiations with leadership of Pixar Animation Studios, Steve Jobs and Ed Catmull, regarding possible merger. On January 23, 2006, it was announced that Disney would purchase Pixar in an all-stock transaction worth $7.4 billion. The deal was finalized on May 5; and among noteworthy results was the transition of Pixar's CEO and 50.1% shareholder, Steve Jobs, becoming Disney's largest individual shareholder at 7% and a member of Disney's Board of Directors. Ed Catmull took over as President of Pixar Animation Studios. Former Executive Vice-President of Pixar, John Lasseter, became Chief Creative Officer of both Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios, as well assuming the role of Principal Creative Adviser at Walt Disney Imagineering.
After a long time working in the company as a senior executive and large shareholder, Director Emeritus Roy E. Disney died from stomach cancer on December 16, 2009. At the time of his death, he had roughly 1% of all Disney shares which amounted to 16 million. He is seen to be the last member of the Disney family to be actively involved in the running of the company and working in the company altogether.
On December 31, 2009, Disney acquired Marvel Entertainment, Inc. for $4.24 billion. Disney has stated that their acquisition of the company will not affect Marvel's products, neither will the nature of any Marvel characters be transformed.
In October 2009, Disney Channel president Rich Ross, hired by Iger, replaced Dick Cook as chairman of the company and, in November, began restructuring the company to focus more on family friendly products. Later in January 2010, Disney decided to shut down Miramax after downsizing Touchstone, but one month later, they began selling the Miramax brand and its 700-title film library. On March 12, ImageMovers Digital, Robert Zemeckis's company which Disney had bought in 2007, was shut down. In April 2010, Lyric Street, Disney's country music label in Nashville, was shut down. In May 2010, the company sold the Power Rangers brand, as well as its 700-episode library, back to Haim Saban. In June, the company canceled Jerry Bruckheimer's film project ''Killing Rommel''. In September 2010, Disney Interactive Studios was downsized. In November, two ABC stations were sold.
With the release of ''Tangled'' in 2010, Ed Catmull said that the "princess" genre of films was taking a hiatus until, "someone has a fresh take on it … but we don't have any other musicals or fairytales lined up." He explained that they were looking to get away from the princess era due to the changes in audience composition and preference. However, in the official Facebook page for Disney, Ed Catmull stated that this was just a rumor.
In April 2011, Disney broke ground on Shanghai Disney Resort. Costing $4.4 billion, the resort is slated to open in 2015. Later, in August 2011, Bob Iger stated on a conference call that after the success of the Pixar and Marvel purchases, he and the Walt Disney Company are looking to "buy either new characters or businesses that are capable of creating great characters and great stories."
Its main entertainment features and holdings include Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group, Disney Music Group, Walt Disney Theatrical, Disney-ABC Television Group, Radio Disney, ESPN Inc., Disney Interactive Media Group, Disney Consumer Products, Pixar Studios, and Marvel Entertainment. Its resorts and diversified holdings include Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Disneyland Resort, Walt Disney World Resort, Tokyo Disney Resort, Disneyland Paris, Euro Disney S.C.A., Hong Kong Disneyland Resort, Disney Vacation Club and Disney Cruise Line.
+ Annual gross revenues of The Walt Disney Company (in millions USD) | ||||||
Year | Walt Disney Studio Entertainment | Disney Consumer Products | !style="width:150px" | Disney Media Networks | Walt Disney Internet Group / Disney Interactive Media Group | Total |
1991 | 2,593.0 | 724 | 2,794.0 | 6,111 | ||
1992 | 3,115 | 1,081 | 3,306 | 7,502 | ||
1993 | 3,673.4 | 1,415.1 | 3,440.7 | 8,529 | ||
1994 | 4,793 | 1,798.2 | 3,463.6 | 359 | 10,414 | |
1995 | 6,001.5 | 2,150 | 3,959.8 | 414 | 12,525 | |
1996 | 4,502 | 4,142 | 18,739 | |||
1997 | 6,981 | 3,782 | 5,014 | 6,522 | 174 | 22,473 |
1998 | 6,849 | 3,193 | 5,532 | 7,142 | 260 | 22,976 |
1999 | 6,548 | 3,030 | 6,106 | 7,512 | 206 | 23,402 |
2000 | 5,994 | 2,602 | 6,803 | 9,615 | 368 | 25,402 |
2001 | 7,004 | 2,590 | 6,009 | 9,569 | 25,790 | |
2002 | 6,465 | 2,440 | 6,691 | 9,733 | 25,360 | |
2003 | 7,364 | 2,344 | 6,412 | 10,941 | 27,061 | |
2004 | 8,713 | 2,511 | 7,750 | 11,778 | 30,752 | |
2005 | 7,587 | 2,127 | 9,023 | 13,207 | 31,944 | |
2006 | 7,529 | 2,193 | 9,925 | 14,368 | 34,285 | |
2007 | 7,491 | 2,347 | 10,626 | 15,046 | 35,510 | |
2008 | 7,348 | 2,415 | 11,504 | 15,857 | 719 | 37,843 |
2009 | 712 | |||||
2010 | 761 |
+ Net income of The Walt Disney Company (in millions USD) | ||||||
Year | Walt Disney Studio Entertainment | Disney Consumer Products | !style="width:150px" | Disney Media Networks | Walt Disney Internet Group / Disney Interactive Media Group | Total |
1991 | 318 | 229 | 546 | 1,094 | ||
1992 | 508 | 283 | 644 | 1,435 | ||
1993 | 622 | 355 | 746 | 1,724 | ||
1994 | 779 | 425 | 684 | 77 | 1,965 | |
1995 | 998 | 510 | 860 | 76 | 2,445 | |
1996 | 990 | 747 | −300 | 3,035 | ||
1997 | 1,079 | 893 | 1,136 | 1,699 | −56 | 4,312 |
1998 | 769 | 801 | 1,288 | 1,746 | −94 | 3,231 |
1999 | 116 | 607 | 1,446 | 1,611 | −93 | 3,231 |
2000 | 110 | 455 | 1,620 | 2,298 | −402 | 4,081 |
2001 | 260 | 401 | 1,586 | 1,758 | 4,214 | |
2002 | 273 | 394 | 1,169 | 986 | 2,826 | |
2003 | 620 | 384 | 957 | 1,213 | 3,174 | |
2004 | 662 | 534 | 1,123 | 2 169 | 4,488 | |
2005 | 207 | 543 | 1,178 | 3,209 | 5,137 | |
2006 | 729 | 618 | 1,534 | 3,610 | 6,491 | |
2007 | 1,201 | 631 | 1,710 | 4,285 | 7,827 | |
2008 | 1,086 | 778 | 1,897 | 4,942 | −258 | 8,445 |
2009 | −295 | |||||
2010 | −234 |
Some religious welfare groups, such as the Catholic League, have opposed films including ''Priest'' (1994) and ''Dogma'' (1999). A book called ''Growing Up Gay'', published by Disney-owned Hyperion Press and similar publications, as well as the company's extension of benefits to same-sex domestic partners, spurred boycotts of Disney and its advertisers by the Catholic League, the Assemblies of God USA, the American Family Association, and other conservative groups. The boycotts were discontinued by most of these organizations by 2005. In addition to these social controversies, the company has been accused of human rights violations regarding the working conditions in factories that produce their merchandise.
Category:Amusement park companies Category:Burbank, California Category:Companies based in Los Angeles County, California Category:Companies established in 1923 Category:Dow Jones Industrial Average Category:Entertainment companies of the United States Category:Irish American history Category:Media companies of the United States
ar:شركة والت ديزني zh-min-nan:Walt Disney Kong-si br:The Walt Disney Company bg:The Walt Disney Company ca:The Walt Disney Company cs:The Walt Disney Company da:The Walt Disney Company de:The Walt Disney Company es:The Walt Disney Company eo:Walt Disney Company eu:The Walt Disney Company fa:شرکت والت دیزنی fr:The Walt Disney Company ga:Disney gl:The Walt Disney Company ko:월트 디즈니 컴퍼니 hi:द वॉल्ट डिज़्नी कंपनी hr:The Walt Disney Company id:The Walt Disney Company is:Walt Disney-fyrirtækið it:The Walt Disney Company he:חברת וולט דיסני jv:The Walt Disney Company ka:უოლტ დისნეის კომპანია sw:The Walt Disney Company la:Walt Disney Societas lt:The Walt Disney Company hu:The Walt Disney Company mk:The Walt Disney Company ml:ദ വാൾട്ട് ഡിസ്നി കമ്പനി ms:Syarikat Walt Disney nl:The Walt Disney Company ja:ウォルト・ディズニー・カンパニー no:The Walt Disney Company nn:The Walt Disney Company pl:The Walt Disney Company pt:The Walt Disney Company ro:The Walt Disney Company ru:The Walt Disney Company sq:The Walt Disney Company simple:The Walt Disney Company sr:Компанија Волт Дизни fi:The Walt Disney Company sv:Walt Disney Company tl:The Walt Disney Company ta:வால்ட் டிஸ்னி கம்பனி te:వాల్ట్ డిస్నీ సంస్థ th:เดอะวอลต์ดิสนีย์ tr:The Walt Disney Company uk:The Walt Disney Company vi:Công ty Walt Disney zh:华特迪士尼公司
This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 38°53′51.61″N77°2′11.58″N |
---|---|
Name | Tank |
Background | solo_singer |
Birth name | Durrell Babbs |
Born | January 01, 1976Milwaukee, Wisconsin, US |
Origin | Washington, DC, US |
Genre | R&B;, pop, hip hop, dance, crunk&B;, reggae |
Occupation(s) | Singer, dancer, actor, model, musician |
Instruments | Vocals, keyboard, piano, drums |
Years active | 1996–present |
Label | Blackground (2000-2009), Atlantic (2010-Present) |
Associated acts | TGT, Tyrese, Ginuwine, The Underdogs, Aaliyah, Omarion |
Website | www.TheRealTank.com }} |
In 2002, Tank released his second album ''One Man'' and a single of the same name.
Tank released his third solo album entitled "Sex, Love & Pain" on May 15, 2007. The lead single was intended to be "I Luv Dem Girls", but for unknown reasons the song was given to Marques Houston who renamed it "Strip Club" (intending to place it on his third solo album "Veteran"). However, "Strip Club" did not make "Veteran," and "Sex, Love & Pain"'s last track is the Timbaland remix to "I Luv Dem Girls". The first single from Tank's third album was "Please Don't Go". Later in the year Tank, Ginuwine and Tyrese Gibson formed a group called TGT. Their first single was a remix of "Please Don't Go" with an international tour entitled "The Shirts Off Tour" and search for a fourth member to follow. Tank released his fourth studio album, ''Now or Never'', on December 14, 2010. Tank collaborated with other artists on this project like Chris Brown, Drake, Letoya Luckett and many other artists.
Tank's song writing and production credits include working with Dave Hollister, Marques Houston, Omarion, Jamie Foxx, Donell Jones and Monica amongst others. As an associate of production team The Underdogs, also Harvey Mason and with his team, Song Dynasty. He has worked with many different artists over the years and was also a contributor to the score of the film adaptation of the musical ''Dreamgirls'', in which he also had a cameo. He was also featured in the movie "The Preacher's Kid."
Year | Album | Chart positions | !align="center" rowspan="2" width="150" | |
!width="60" | !width="60" | |||
align="left" valign="top" |
¹Copies shipneeds
Year | Title | Chart positions | Album | ||
! width="40" | ! width="40" | ! width="40" | |||
align="left" | |||||
align="left" | |||||
align="left" | |||||
align="left" | |||||
align="left" | |||||
Category:African American singers Category:American rhythm and blues singers Category:American male singers Category:Living people Category:People from Milwaukee, Wisconsin Category:People from Washington, D.C. Category:1976 births
es:Tank (cantante norteamericano) fr:Tank (chanteur) it:Tank (cantante statunitense) pl:Tank (wokalista)This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Coordinates | 38°53′51.61″N77°2′11.58″N |
---|---|
name | Walt Disney |
birth name | Walter Elias Disney |
birth date | December 05, 1901 |
birth place | Hermosa, Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
death date | December 15, 1966 |
death place | Burbank, California, U.S.
Interred: Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale, California, U.S. |
occupation | Film producer, Co-founder of The Walt Disney Company, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions |
yearsactive | 1920–1966 |
spouse | Lillian Bounds (1925–1966) |
parents | Elias DisneyFlora Call Disney |
relations | Herbert Arthur Disney (brother)Raymond Arnold Disney (brother)Roy Oliver Disney (brother)Ruth Flora Disney (sister)Ronald William Miller (son-in-law)Robert Borgfeldt Brown (son-in-law)Roy Edward Disney (nephew) |
children | Diane Marie DisneySharon Mae Disney |
religion | Christian (Congregationalist) |
party | Republican |
signature | Walt Disney Signature 2.svg }} |
Disney is particularly noted as a film producer and a popular showman, as well as an innovator in animation and theme park design. He and his staff created some of the world's most well-known fictional characters including Mickey Mouse, for whom Disney himself provided the original voice. During his lifetime he received four honorary Academy Awards and won twenty-two Academy Awards from a total of fifty-nine nominations, including a record four in one year, giving him more awards and nominations than any other individual in history. Disney also won seven Emmy Awards and gave his name to the Disneyland and Walt Disney World Resort theme parks in the U.S., as well as the international resorts Tokyo Disney, Disneyland Paris, and Disneyland Hong Kong.
The year after his December 15, 1966 death from lung cancer in Burbank, California, construction began on Walt Disney World Resort in Florida. His brother Roy Disney inaugurated the Magic Kingdom on October 1, 1971.
In 1878, Disney's father Elias had moved from Huron County, Ontario, Canada to the United States at first seeking gold in California before finally settling down to farm with his parents near Ellis, Kansas, until 1884. Elias worked for the Union Pacific Railroad and married Flora Call on January 1, 1888, in Acron, Florida. The family moved to Chicago, Illinois, in 1890, hometown of his brother Robert who helped Elias financially for most of his early life. In 1906, when Walt was four, Elias and his family moved to a farm in Marceline, Missouri, where his brother Roy had recently purchased farmland. In Marceline, Disney developed his love for drawing with one of the family's neighbors, a retired doctor named "Doc" Sherwood, paying him to draw pictures of Sherwood's horse, Rupert. His interest in trains also developed in Marceline, a town that owed its existence to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway which ran through it. Walt would put his ear to the tracks in anticipation of the coming train then try and spot his uncle, engineer Michael Martin, running the train.
The Disneys remained in Marceline for four years, before moving to Kansas City in 1911 where Walt and his younger sister Ruth attended the Benton Grammar School. At school he met Walter Pfeiffer who came from a family of theatre aficionados, and introduced Walt to the world of vaudeville and motion pictures. Before long Walt was spending more time at the Pfeiffers' than at home. As well as attending Saturday courses at the Kansas City Art Institute, Walt often took Ruth to Electric Park, 15 blocks from their home, which Disney would later acknowledge as a major influence of his design of Disneyland).
After his rejection by the army, Walt and a friend decided to join the Red Cross. Soon after joining he was sent to France for a year, where he drove an ambulance, but only after the armistice was signed on November 11, 1918.
Hoping to find work outside the Chicago O-Zell factory, in 1919 Walt moved back to Kansas City to begin his artistic career. After considering whether to become an actor or a newspaper artist, he decided on a career as a newspaper artist, drawing political caricatures or comic strips. But when nobody wanted to hire him as either an artist or even as an ambulance driver, his brother Roy, then working in a local bank, got Walt a temporary job through a bank colleague at the Pesmen-Rubin Art Studio where he created advertisements for newspapers, magazines, and movie theaters. At Pesmen-Rubin he met cartoonist Ubbe Iwerks and when their time at the studio expired, they decided to start their own commercial company together.
In January 1920, Disney and Iwerks formed a short-lived company called, "Iwerks-Disney Commercial Artists". However, following a rough start, Disney left temporarily to earn money at the Kansas City Film Ad Company, and was soon joined by Iwerks who was not able to run their business alone. While working for the Kansas City Film Ad Company, where he made commercials based on cutout animations, Disney became interested in animation, and decided to become an animator. The owner of the Ad Company, A.V. Cauger, allowed him to borrow a camera from work to experiment with at home. After reading the Edwin G. Lutz book ''Animated Cartoons: How They Are Made, Their Origin and Development'', Disney considered cel animation to be much more promising than the cutout animation he was doing for Cauger. Walt eventually decided to open his own animation business, and recruited a fellow co-worker at the Kansas City Film Ad Company, Fred Harman, as his first employee. Walt and Harman then secured a deal with local theater owner Frank L. Newman, arguably the most popular "showman" in the Kansas City area at the time, to screen their cartoons at his local theater, which they titled ''Laugh-O-Grams''.
The new series, ''Alice Comedies'', proved reasonably successful, and featured both Dawn O'Day and Margie Gay as Alice with Lois Hardwick also briefly assuming the role. By the time the series ended in 1927, its focus was more on the animated characters and in particular a cat named Julius who resembled Felix the Cat, rather than the live-action Alice.
Disney went to New York in February 1928 to negotiate a higher fee per short and was shocked when Mintz told him that not only did he want to reduce the fee he paid Disney per short but also that he had most of his main animators, including Harman, Ising, Maxwell, and Freleng—but not Iwerks, who refused to leave Disney—under contract and would start his own studio if Disney did not accept the reduced production budgets. Universal, not Disney, owned the Oswald trademark, and could make the films without Walt. Disney declined Mintz's offer and as a result lost most of his animation staff whereupon he found himself on his own again.
It subsequently took his company 78 years to get back the rights to the Oswald character when in 2006 the Walt Disney Company reacquired the rights to Oswald the Lucky Rabbit from NBC Universal, through a trade for longtime ABC sports commentator Al Michaels.
After losing the rights to Oswald, Disney felt the need to develop a new character to replace him, which was based on a mouse he had adopted as a pet while working in his Laugh-O-Gram studio in Kansas City. Ub Iwerks reworked the sketches made by Disney to make the character easier to animate although Mickey's voice and personality were provided by Disney himself until 1947. In the words of one Disney employee, "Ub designed Mickey's physical appearance, but Walt gave him his soul." Besides Oswald and Mickey, a similar mouse-character is seen in the ''Alice Comedies'', which featured "Ike the Mouse". Moreover, the first Flip the Frog cartoon called Fiddlesticks showed a Mickey Mouse look-alike playing fiddle. The initial films were animated by Iwerks with his name prominently featured on the title cards. Originally named "Mortimer", the mouse was later re-christened "Mickey" by Lillian Disney who thought that the name Mortimer did not fit. Mortimer later became the name of Mickey's rival for Minnie – taller than his renowned adversary and speaking with a Brooklyn accent.
The first animated short to feature Mickey, ''Plane Crazy'' was a silent film like all of Disney's previous works. After failing to find a distributor for the short and its follow-up, ''The Gallopin' Gaucho'', Disney created a Mickey cartoon with sound entitled ''Steamboat Willie''. A businessman named Pat Powers provided Disney with both distribution and Cinephone, a sound-synchronization process. ''Steamboat Willie'' became an instant success, and ''Plane Crazy'', ''The Galloping Gaucho'', and all future Mickey cartoons were released with soundtracks. After the release of ''Steamboat Willie'', Disney successfully used sound in all of his subsequent cartoons, and Cinephone also became the new distributor for Disney's early sound cartoons. Mickey soon eclipsed Felix the Cat as the world's most popular cartoon character and by 1930, despite their having sound, cartoons featuring Felix had faded from the screen after failing to gain attention. Mickey's popularity would subsequently skyrocket in the early 1930s.
Iwerks was soon lured by Powers into opening his own studio with an exclusive contract, while Stalling would also later leave Disney to join Iwerks. Iwerks launched his ''Flip the Frog'' series with the first voiced color cartoon ''Fiddlesticks'', filmed in two-strip Technicolor. Iwerks also created two other cartoon series, ''Willie Whopper'' and the ''Comicolor''. In 1936, Iwerks shut down his studio in order to work on various projects dealing with animation technology. He would return to Disney in 1940 and go on to pioneer a number of film processes and specialized animation technologies in the studio's research and development department.
By 1932, although Mickey Mouse had become a relatively popular cinema character, ''Silly Symphonies'' was not as successful. The same year also saw competition increase as Max Fleischer's flapper cartoon character, Betty Boop, gained popularity among theater audiences. Fleischer, considered Disney's main rival in the 1930s, was also the father of Richard Fleischer, whom Disney would later hire to direct his 1954 film ''20,000 Leagues Under the Sea''. Meanwhile, Columbia Pictures dropped the distribution of Disney cartoons to be replaced by United Artists. In late 1932, Herbert Kalmus, who had just completed work on the first three-strip technicolor camera, approached Walt and convinced him to reshoot the black and white ''Flowers and Trees'' in three-strip Technicolor. ''Flowers and Trees'' would go on to be a phenomenal success and would also win the first 1932 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. After the release of ''Flowers and Trees'', all subsequent ''Silly Symphony'' cartoons were in color while Disney was also able to negotiate a two-year deal with Technicolor, giving him the sole right to use their three-strip process, a period eventually extended to five years. Through ''Silly Symphonies'', Disney also created his most successful cartoon short of all time, ''The Three Little Pigs'' (1933). The cartoon ran in theaters for many months, featuring the hit song that became the anthem of the Great Depression, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf".
Following the creation of two cartoon series, in 1934 Disney began planning a full-length feature. The following year, opinion polls showed that another cartoon series, ''Popeye the Sailor'', produced by Max Fleischer, was more popular than Mickey Mouse. Nevertheless, Disney was able to put Mickey back on top as well as increase his popularity by colorizing and partially redesigning the character to become what was considered his most appealing design to date. When the film industry learned of Disney's plans to produce an ''animated'' feature-length version of ''Snow White'', they were certain that the endeavor would destroy the Disney Studio and dubbed the project "Disney's Folly". Both Lillian and Roy tried to talk Disney out of the project, but he continued plans for the feature, employing Chouinard Art Institute professor Don Graham to start a training operation for the studio staff. Disney then used the ''Silly Symphonies'' as a platform for experiments in realistic human animation, distinctive character animation, special effects, and the use of specialized processes and apparatus such as the multiplane camera – a new technique first used by Disney in the 1937 ''Silly Symphonies'' short ''The Old Mill''.
All of this development and training was used to increase quality at the studio and to ensure that the feature film would match Disney's quality expectations. Entitled ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'', the feature went into full production in 1934 and continued until mid-1937, when the studio ran out of money. To obtain the funding to complete ''Snow White'', Disney had to show a rough cut of the motion picture to loan officers at the Bank of America, who then gave the studio the money to finish the picture. The film premiered at the Carthay Circle Theater on December 21, 1937 and at its conclusion the audience gave ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' a standing ovation. ''Snow White'', the first animated feature in America made in Technicolor, was released in February 1938 under a new distribution deal with RKO Radio Pictures. RKO had been the distributor for Disney cartoons in 1936, after it closed down the Van Beuren Studios in exchange for distribution. The film became the most successful motion picture of 1938 and earned over $8 million on its initial release.
''Pinocchio'' and ''Fantasia'' followed ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' into the movie theaters in 1940, but both proved financial disappointments. The inexpensive ''Dumbo'' was then planned as an income generator, but during production most of the animation staff went on strike, permanently straining relations between Disney and his artists.
Shortly after the release of ''Dumbo'' in October 1941, the United States entered World War II. The U.S. Army contracted most of the Disney studio's facilities where the staff created training and instruction films for the military, home-front morale-boosting shorts such as ''Der Fuehrer's Face'' and the 1943 feature film ''Victory Through Air Power''. However, military films did not generate income, and the feature film ''Bambi'' underperformed on its release in April 1942. Disney successfully re-issued ''Snow White'' in 1944, establishing a seven-year re-release tradition for his features. In 1945, ''The Three Caballeros'' was the last animated feature released by the studio during the war.
In 1944, ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' publisher William Benton, entered into unsuccessful negotiations with Disney to make six to twelve educational films per annum. Disney was asked by the US Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, Office of Inter-American Affairs (OIAA), to make an educational film about the Amazon Basin, which resulted in the 1944 animated short, ''The Amazon Awakens''.
By the late 1940s, the studio had recovered enough to continue production on the full-length features ''Alice in Wonderland'' and ''Peter Pan'', both of which had been shelved during the war years. Work also began on ''Cinderella'', which became Disney's most successful film since ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs''. In 1948 the studio also initiated a series of live-action nature films, titled ''True-Life Adventures'', with ''On Seal Island'' the first. Despite its resounding success with feature films, the studio's animation shorts were no longer as popular as they once were, with people paying more attention to Warner Bros. and their animation star Bugs Bunny. By 1942, Leon Schlesinger Productions, which produced the Warner Bros. cartoons, had become the country's most popular animation studio. However, while Bugs Bunny's popularity rose in the 1940s, so did Donald Duck's, a character who would replace Mickey Mouse as Disney's star character by 1949.
During the mid-1950s, Disney produced a number of educational films on the space program in collaboration with NASA rocket designer Wernher von Braun: ''Man in Space'' and ''Man and the Moon'' in 1955, and ''Mars and Beyond'' in 1957.
Disney also accused the Screen Actors Guild of being a Communist front, and charged that the 1941 strike was part of an organized Communist effort to gain influence in Hollywood.
As Disney explained one of his earliest plans to Herb Ryman, who created the first aerial drawing of Disneyland presented to the Bank of America during fund raising for the project, he said, "Herbie, I just want it to look like nothing else in the world. And it should be surrounded by a train." Entertaining his daughters and their friends in his backyard and taking them for rides on his Carolwood Pacific Railroad had inspired Disney to include a railroad in the plans for Disneyland.
As the studio expanded and diversified into other media, Disney devoted less of his attention to the animation department, entrusting most of its operations to his key animators, whom he dubbed the Nine Old Men. Although he was spending less time supervising the production of the animated films, he was always present at story meetings.. During Disney's lifetime, the animation department created the successful ''Lady and the Tramp'' ( the first animated film in CinemaScope) in 1955, ''Sleeping Beauty'' ( the first animated film in Super Technirama 70mm) in 1959, ''One Hundred and One Dalmatians'' (the first animated feature film to use Xerox cels) in 1961, and ''The Sword in the Stone'' in 1963.
Production of short cartoons kept pace until 1956, when Disney shut down the responsible division although special shorts projects would continue for the remainder of the studio's duration on an irregular basis. These productions were all distributed by Disney's new subsidiary, Buena Vista Distribution, which had taken over all distribution duties for Disney films from RKO by 1955. Disneyland, one of the world's first theme parks, finally opened on July 17, 1955, and was immediately successful. Visitors from around the world came to visit Disneyland, which contained attractions based on a number of successful Disney characters and films.
After 1955, the ''Disneyland'' TV show was renamed ''Walt Disney Presents''. It switched from black-and-white to color in 1961 and changed its name to ''Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color'', at the same time moving from ABC to NBC, and eventually evolving into its current form as ''The Wonderful World of Disney''. The series continued to air on NBC until 1981, when it was picked up by CBS. Since then, it has aired on ABC, NBC, the Hallmark Channel and the Cartoon Network via separate broadcast rights deals. During its run, the Disney series offered some recurring characters, such as the newspaper reporter and sleuth "Gallegher" played by Roger Mobley with a plot based on the writings of Richard Harding Davis.
Disney had already formed his own music publishing division in 1949 and in 1956, partly inspired by the huge success of the television theme song The Ballad of Davy Crockett, he created a company-owned record production and distribution entity called Disneyland Records.
After decades of pursuit, Disney finally acquired the rights to P.L. Travers' books about a magical nanny. ''Mary Poppins'', released in 1964, was the most successful Disney film of the 1960s and featured a memorable song score written by Disney favorites, the Sherman Brothers. The same year, Disney debuted a number of exhibits at the 1964 New York World's Fair, including Audio-Animatronic figures, all of which were later integrated into attractions at Disneyland and a new theme park project which was to be established on the East Coast.
Although the studio would probably have proved major competition for Hanna-Barbera, Disney decided not to enter the race and mimic Hanna-Barbera by producing Saturday morning TV cartoon series. With the expansion of Disney's empire and constant production of feature films, the financial burden involved in such a move would have proven too great.
Disney was cremated on December 17, 1966, and his ashes interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. Roy O. Disney continued out with the Florida project, insisting that the name be changed to Walt Disney World in honor of his brother.
The final productions in which Disney played an active role were the animated features ''The Jungle Book'' and ''Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day'', as well as the live-action musical comedy ''The Happiest Millionaire'', both released in 1967. Songwriter Robert B. Sherman recalled of the last time he saw Disney: }}
A long-standing urban legend maintains that Disney was cryogenically frozen, and his frozen corpse stored beneath the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. However, the first known cryogenic freezing of a human corpse did not occur until January 1967, more than a month after his death.
After giving his dedication for Walt Disney World, Roy asked Lillian Disney to join him. As the orchestra played "When You Wish Upon a Star", she stepped up to the podium accompanied by Mickey Mouse. He then said, "Lilly, you knew all of Walt's ideas and hopes as well as anybody; what would Walt think of it [Walt Disney World]?". "I think Walt would have approved," she replied. Roy died from a cerebral hemorrhage on December 20, 1971, the day he was due to open the Disneyland Christmas parade. During the second phase of the "Walt Disney World" theme park, EPCOT was translated by Disney's successors into EPCOT Center, which opened in 1982. As it currently exists, EPCOT is essentially a living world's fair, different from the actual functional city that Disney had envisioned. In 1992, Walt Disney Imagineering took the step closer to Disney's original ideas and dedicated Celebration, Florida, a town built by the Walt Disney Company adjacent to Walt Disney World, that hearkens back to the spirit of EPCOT. EPCOT was also originally intended to be devoid of Disney characters which initially limited the appeal of the park to young children. However, the company later changed this policy and Disney characters can now be found throughout the park, often dressed in costumes reflecting the different pavilions.
In an early admissions bulletin, Disney explained: }}
The Walt Disney Family Museum acknowledges that Disney did have "difficult relationships" with some Jewish individuals, and that ethnic stereotypes common to films of the 1930s were included in some early cartoons, such as ''Three Little Pigs''. However, the museum points out that Disney employed Jews throughout his career and was named "1955 Man Of The Year" by the B'nai B'rith chapter in Beverly Hills.
Walt Disney received the Congressional Gold Medal on May 24, 1968 (P.L. 90-316, 82 Stat. 130–131) and the Légion d'Honneur awarded by France in 1935. In 1935, Walt received a special medal from the League of Nations for creation of Mickey Mouse, held to be Mickey Mouse award. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom on September 14, 1964. On December 6, 2006, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver inducted Walt Disney into the California Hall of Fame located at The California Museum for History, Women, and the Arts.
A minor planet, 4017 Disneya, discovered in 1980 by Soviet astronomer Lyudmila Georgievna Karachkina, is named after him.
The Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, opened in 2003, was named in his honor.
In 1993, HBO began development of a Walt Disney biopic directed by Frank Pierson and featuring Lawrence Turman but the project never materialized and was soon abandoned. However, ''Walt - The Man Behind the Myth'', a biographical documentary about Disney, was later made.
Category:1901 births Category:1966 deaths Category:American animators Category:American anti-communists Category:American cartoonists Category:American Congregationalists Category:American Christians Category:American entertainment industry businesspeople Category:American film directors Category:American film producers Category:American screenwriters Category:American television personalities Category:American voice actors Category:Animated film directors Category:Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale) Category:California Republicans Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:Congressional Gold Medal recipients Category:Deaths from lung cancer Category:Disney comics writers Category:Disney people Category:English-language film directors Category:Film studio executives Category:American artists of German descent Category:American writers of German descent Category:Illinois Republicans Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:American people of Canadian descent Category:American people of English descent Category:American people of French descent Category:Kansas City Art Institute alumni Category:National Inventors Hall of Fame inductees Category:People from Chicago, Illinois Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients Category:School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni Category:Animated film producers
af:Walt Disney ar:والت ديزني an:Walt Disney az:Uolt Disney bn:ওয়াল্ট ডিজনি be:Уолт Дысней be-x-old:Ўолт Дыснэй bs:Walt Disney br:Walt Disney bg:Уолт Дисни ca:Walt Disney cs:Walt Disney cy:Walt Disney da:Walt Disney de:Walt Disney et:Walt Disney el:Ουώλτ Ντίσνεϋ es:Walt Disney eo:Walt Disney ext:Walt Disney eu:Walt Disney fa:والت دیزنی hif:Walt Disney fr:Walt Disney fy:Walt Disney ga:Walt Disney gl:Walt Disney ko:월트 디즈니 hi:वॉल्ट डिज़्नी hr:Walt Disney io:Walt Disney id:Walt Disney ia:Walt Disney os:Дисней, Уолт is:Walt Disney it:Walt Disney he:וולט דיסני jv:Walt Disney kn:ವಾಲ್ಟ್ ಡಿಸ್ನಿ ka:უოლტ დისნეი kk:Уолт Дисней sw:Walt Disney la:Gualterius Elias Disney lv:Volts Disnejs lb:Walt Disney lt:Walt Disney li:Walt Disney hu:Walt Disney mk:Волт Дизни ml:വാൾട്ട് ഡിസ്നി mr:वॉल्ट डिस्नी arz:والت ديزنى ms:Walt Disney mn:Уолт Дисней nl:Walt Disney new:वाल्ट डिज्नी ja:ウォルト・ディズニー no:Walt Disney nn:Walt Disney oc:Walt Disney pnb:والٹ ڈزنی nds:Walt Disney pl:Walt Disney pt:Walt Disney kbd:Уолт Дисней ro:Walt Disney qu:Walt Disney rue:Уолт Дісней ru:Дисней, Уолт sah:Уолт Дисней se:Walt Disney sa:वाल्ट डिज्नी sq:Walt Disney scn:Walt Disney simple:Walt Disney sk:Walt Disney sl:Walt Disney szl:Walt Disney sr:Волт Дизни sh:Walt Disney fi:Walt Disney sv:Walt Disney tl:Walt Disney ta:வால்ட் டிஸ்னி tt:Уолт Дисней te:వాల్ట్ డిస్నీ th:วอลต์ ดิสนีย์ tg:Уолтер Элайас Дисней tr:Walt Disney uk:Волт Дісней ur:والٹ ڈزنی vi:Walt Disney vo:Walt Disney war:Walt Disney zh-yue:和路迪士尼 bat-smg:Volts Dėsniejos zh:華特·迪士尼
This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
The World News (WN) Network, has created this privacy statement in order to demonstrate our firm commitment to user privacy. The following discloses our information gathering and dissemination practices for wn.com, as well as e-mail newsletters.
We do not collect personally identifiable information about you, except when you provide it to us. For example, if you submit an inquiry to us or sign up for our newsletter, you may be asked to provide certain information such as your contact details (name, e-mail address, mailing address, etc.).
When you submit your personally identifiable information through wn.com, you are giving your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as set forth in this Privacy Policy. If you would prefer that we not collect any personally identifiable information from you, please do not provide us with any such information. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information to third parties without your consent, except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy.
Except as otherwise disclosed in this Privacy Policy, we will use the information you provide us only for the purpose of responding to your inquiry or in connection with the service for which you provided such information. We may forward your contact information and inquiry to our affiliates and other divisions of our company that we feel can best address your inquiry or provide you with the requested service. We may also use the information you provide in aggregate form for internal business purposes, such as generating statistics and developing marketing plans. We may share or transfer such non-personally identifiable information with or to our affiliates, licensees, agents and partners.
We may retain other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf. Such third parties may be provided with access to personally identifiable information needed to perform their functions, but may not use such information for any other purpose.
In addition, we may disclose any information, including personally identifiable information, we deem necessary, in our sole discretion, to comply with any applicable law, regulation, legal proceeding or governmental request.
We do not want you to receive unwanted e-mail from us. We try to make it easy to opt-out of any service you have asked to receive. If you sign-up to our e-mail newsletters we do not sell, exchange or give your e-mail address to a third party.
E-mail addresses are collected via the wn.com web site. Users have to physically opt-in to receive the wn.com newsletter and a verification e-mail is sent. wn.com is clearly and conspicuously named at the point of
collection.If you no longer wish to receive our newsletter and promotional communications, you may opt-out of receiving them by following the instructions included in each newsletter or communication or by e-mailing us at michaelw(at)wn.com
The security of your personal information is important to us. We follow generally accepted industry standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during registration and once we receive it. No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100 percent secure, however. Therefore, though we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
If we decide to change our e-mail practices, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the homepage, and other places we think appropriate so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.
If we make material changes to our e-mail practices, we will notify you here, by e-mail, and by means of a notice on our home page.
The advertising banners and other forms of advertising appearing on this Web site are sometimes delivered to you, on our behalf, by a third party. In the course of serving advertisements to this site, the third party may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser. For more information on cookies, you can visit www.cookiecentral.com.
As we continue to develop our business, we might sell certain aspects of our entities or assets. In such transactions, user information, including personally identifiable information, generally is one of the transferred business assets, and by submitting your personal information on Wn.com you agree that your data may be transferred to such parties in these circumstances.