I pick my room at some of the hotels I stay at and I appreciate that ........... but we are also talking about hotels with 300-400 rooms or less, and hotels that do business knowing most times of year they will not be sold out or close to aka incorporated into their fiscal projections.
Disney works hard at high, very high, occupancy year round. You are talking about Disney hotels that have 1000, 2000 even one with 3000 rooms. The smaller hotels at Disney have 600-800 rooms plus DVC rooms. It would be a logistical nightmare, a customer service nightmare and likely result in lost income for a variety of reasons that would tie to customers selecting rooms.
I vote no.
I worked in hotels and followed the hospitality industry for decades. (I also worked at Disney World, but not in any of the Resorts.) Your answer is the one I'd say is spot on.
Room assignments are done to maximize use and avoid having "orphan" rooms. The best analogy I've seen is the classic video game Tetris. Hotels assign rooms within booked categories in logical manner to ensure that tomorrow's reservations will still space within the same category.
While it's possible some people might pay extra to get some sort of guaranteed room, you also create a new way to upset guests. If a room has a maintenance issue, you just upset the guest expecting to stay in that room. If an in-house guest wants to extend her or his stay but can't because the room was reserved, you just upset that person.
It's an interesting idea. I'm almost certain that someone at Disney with a MBA has thought about it at some point in the past 10 years. But, logistically it's not an easy thing to do.
THIS^
Because no matter the extra fee you are willing to pay, Disney would lose so much money from not being able to maximize occupancy.
I do have to add that on the DIS unplugged podcast, there was some speculation that the Star Wars hotel could work more like a cruise ship. I can see them being able to fill that hotel for quite some time even if you can only book certain stays like a cruise.
This would make sense except for one thing ...... the hotel has been rumored to have no windows, only simulation views. If category were the only issue, what difference does it make to pick a room? The "view" is what matters on the ship, but if there is no view? I don't get why it would be an option. The hotel is not moving, so deck, aft, forward don't matter. Now I could see if you booked "imaginary" views/themes but that goes back to category or maybe category then a theme within that category. If your choice is booked then you pick another choice.
If they are 3 night or 4 night experiences, like a cruise, then it would be a very similar perk to offer and easy enough to do - just don't know why given the supposed structure.