The Walt Disney Company should start a third-party software developer program. There are plenty of hobbyists and small developers that would like to have official access to some of the data available for the theme parks, Disney Plus, and other data available from the company.
If done with an approval process, and perhaps even incentives, it could be an effective way for Disney to improve guest experiences by effectively letting others innovate on the guests’ behalf. Instead of Disney having a development bottleneck of their own development teams, it would allow others to create tools that compete with each other for the best experiences.
There’s already some of this using unofficial data sources. By bringing it under an official Developer Program they could enforce things they’d like to have available but don’t have time to develop themselves.
API’s that I’d like to see and could see immediate use for:
- Theme Park Basics Get a list of Resorts, Parks, Attractions, operating hours, and ticket prices
- Ride Wait Times Current wait times that are posted in-app. This would make possible a new way of planning apps instead of using unofficial sources
- Dining Availability See when restaurants have availability and ideally be able to make a reservation on behalf of a user
- Disney Plus Media Be able to view what’s currently available for viewing on Disney+. Maybe even a users’s watch history, wishlist, etc
- Disney Photopass Photos Be able to retrieve a users photos
What other Disney API’s would you like to see offered?
Also Disney Cruise itineraries and availability!
Couldn’t agree more! Plus the tools out there today are probably so brittle – the second Disney changes an API, the tool breaks and developers have to reverse-engineer to get it working again.
Sadly, the investment probably doesn’t make sense for Disney. What’s the benefit for them that justifies that cost?
The benefit would be a bunch of innovation that they don’t have to fund themselves. They get lots of developers building stuff on top of their API with them having to design, develop, and maintain it. A marketplace and ecosystem of Disney and adjacent tools that comes up with things they don’t have time or resources to build, or haven’t even thought of.
Many other companies their size do this successfully (although in different industries). Amazon Web Services for technical tools. Shopify and most e-commerce platforms have robust marketplaces. The investment in a small team to standardize, monitor, and deal with approvals can lead to lots of new functionality. The can be eventually expanded even to reward the tools with commissions on things like hotel bookings or dining reservations during off-peak times.