As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
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I'm trying to figure out how I should use the one day park tickets I need to get for my family (when we stay and get the free dining plan). I have an AP, so I'm going to save mine and put it toward my next park ticket. I'll need that in one year. DH and 2 kids each have 10 day passes that I bought already at Ticket Mania and got for 358.00 each. So they will be getting into the parks for 35.80 a day, so it doesn't make sense to use the 63.00 tickets but yet I don't think they'll need park passes for quite some time, so it seems silly to save those to apply to park passes. (We usually go to Disney every year or two and only go into the parks 3 days in our week stay, so at this rate, it would be quite a few years before I'd buy more passes.) I hope that makes sense. What would you do? I am right in assuming that those tickets will have their names on them, so I can't pool all 4 tickets to apply to the next ticket purchase for me, right?
I don't know about the names on the tickets and whether you could apply them all toward yours in the future, but I can tell you what we are planning to do with ours if the dining plan gets extended to include our travel dates.
We also have 10 day tickets with the no expiring option, so I figured if we each had to buy a one day that I would get a VERY basic ticket w/o the no expiring and possibly even without the hopping option and use them this trip and save our no expiring, hopping, magic plus option tickets to use on into infinity. We also use one pass over several years until time to buy another
One question for you....we debated one AP to save on resorts and decided against since at the end of the year DH would still have 6 days or so left and I'd have none. Has it worked out well for your family doing it that way with the AP?
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I'm trying to figure out how I should use the one day park tickets I need to get for my family (when we stay and get the free dining plan). I have an AP, so I'm going to save mine and put it toward my next park ticket. I'll need that in one year. DH and 2 kids each have 10 day passes that I bought already at Ticket Mania and got for 358.00 each. So they will be getting into the parks for 35.80 a day, so it doesn't make sense to use the 63.00 tickets but yet I don't think they'll need park passes for quite some time, so it seems silly to save those to apply to park passes. (We usually go to Disney every year or two and only go into the parks 3 days in our week stay, so at this rate, it would be quite a few years before I'd buy more passes.) I hope that makes sense. What would you do? I am right in assuming that those tickets will have their names on them, so I can't pool all 4 tickets to apply to the next ticket purchase for me, right?
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Michelle, I'm pretty sure you can only use one ticket towars another ticket...I don't think you can take 4 and put towards a new AP.
I would just save them. Then you will have 63.00 towards everybody's ticket whenever you need them. Just don't lose them!!!
One question for you....we debated one AP to save on resorts and decided against since at the end of the year DH would still have 6 days or so left and I'd have none. Has it worked out well for your family doing it that way with the AP?
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I bought 10 day tickets, each, for DH and the 2 kids. I figure I'll buy tickets when I need them after this year is up. I go down with my Mom, so I'll be able to juggle the fact I'll have more days than they do. This is the first time I've had an AP. Other years, I've only gone when room only codes came out. With the expectation that room only codes won't be happening this year, I bought an AP. I have already paid for the AP with savings on my room for my May trip with my Mom (split stay at Pop/Polynesian)and this upcoming trip in August (Pop with free dining and BC with AP). So, I figure I've come out ahead already. All my park days are "free". Plus, I'm going again in Oct., so that'll be more savings.
You'd have to factor in how many days you'd be staying on site within one year's time. Where you would stay would also affect your savings. With the codes for the deluxes this year, I saved a lot of money. You also can add in other savings you get from the AP like percentages off food and recreation. It's always a gamble because you don't know what the codes will be for later in the year or if a different deal will come along and then you won't use the AP.
The other thing you have to factor in is how much you're willing to spend on airfare. Sure, I'm saving a lot with the AP, but it's also drawing me back again and again which means $ on airfare! I hadn't planned on going in May, but a really cheap airfare popped up and my Mom and I went. I figured I might as well take advantage of the AP I was about to purchase, then I figured I've always wanted to go to MNSSHP, so as long as I had the AP, I might as well do it this year...get my point ! I just tried to talk my DH into another trip in Sept. being that would be on the free dining plan. His reponse was, "You've got to get over this Disney thing." Oh well, I tried! There's always Mousefest...
I would just save them. Then you will have 63.00 towards everybody's ticket whenever you need them. Just don't lose them!!!
Elise
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That's what I was leaning toward, too. My only hesitation was that if I do that, would have to do that directly from Disney though. This year, the savings I got from the link to TicketMania was 50.00 over the price I would have paid getting them from Disney. Course, who's to say that savings will still be possible a few years from now. It's always a gamble isn't it?