LAKE BUENA VISTA. Fla. - When Walt Disney World installed its first data processing department in the Magic Kingdom more than 10 years ago, it – literally – buried its hardware underground, away from Goofy, Mickey Mouse and the millions of tourists.
Perhaps reflecting the DP department's emergence from the back room, Disney's new Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow (Epcot) computer center is now a popular exhibit that is expected to attract several million visitors per year.
Epcot Computer Central, a 40.000 square-foot, two-level structure near the gateway to Epcot, was dedicated here last month by officials from Disney and the exhibit's sponsor, Sperry Univac. "Epcot gives us a chance to show that the computer is not ominous and threatening," Univac President Joseph J. Kroger said at a press conference following the ceremony.
The attractions of Computer Central were designed to be anything but threatening to its audience. The main attraction, The Astuter Computer Review, features a three-dimensional, three-foot holograph of a Cockney English imp named Earlie the Pearlie, who dances around the four Univac V77 minicomputers singing "That's why I'm a router for me computer – Everybody needs a friend."
Through an optical trick typical of Disney and Epcot, the working DPers cannot see the 16-minute show even though it appears to be taking place within the DP shop. It actually takes place directly behind them, projected onto the other side of a floor-to-ceiling wall of glass. "We were concerned about the people working there." a Disney spokesman said. "We knew computer people aren't used to being on stage, but it's worked out rather well. They're aware that there is an audience up there all day, but they can't see them."
Although the entertainment is aimed at a child's level, the audience is still presented with a list of reel-world computer applications – many of them on display in various parts of Epcot. Elementary manufacturing systems are simulated on terminals in the Computer Central foyer, as are reservation systems and computer-aided design systems.
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