It's a little bit of a shame that my first real blog post is more about the business of theme parks than their art. Oh well. I promise it won't happen too often.
Harry Potter is going to Universal. Even though the rumors had been trending this way for a while, I'd pretty much convinced myself the rumors were wrong and that J.K. Rowling would sign with Disney. My reasoning was that Ms. Rowling already had all the money should could possibly want, so money wouldn't ultimately factor into the equation. She'd be looking for "legacy," and the only way to get that was to go with the premier company in the field, the company that everyone was already coming to visit, and the company that you wouldn't doubt would still be in the business ten years from now.
After hearing the news, I should have realized: Ms. Rowling doesn't want to be one of several dozen "jewels" in the crown; she wants to be the only one. And that can only happen at Universal. (No matter how important Harry Potter might be to Disney, he'd never be more important than Mickey Mouse, or even Jack Sparrow.) And if Universal does decide to exit the theme park business (I have no special insight into this, though it's something that's been rumored on and off over the past few years), that just gives Rowling another chance to license her asset all over again.
How should Disney react to this? Discussion boards talk of what Disney might try and build to fight back*, but personally, I think what they should do is start a daily bus shuttle over to Universal. Disney probably doesn't care much if people visit Universal for the day, but they probably will care if people stay at a Universal hotel for the whole week. That doesn't have to happen: make Harry Potter an unofficial part of the Disney experience, and let Universal foot the bill. Face it: you're not going to be able to "beat" Harry Potter. All you can do is limit the damage. Or better yet, capitalize on it.
* I've seen some people on the discussion boards suggest a Disney-built "Narnia" land, but please…few are excited enough about Narnia to travel across country for it.