Furby, the official toy of uneasy feelings since 1998. These toys were once the rage during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Every kid wanted one and every parent had to get it. Although they are unsettling to some, they are quite an interesting toy and very advance for their time, which most likely contributed to such high demand for them.
The brilliant minds behind the Furby were Dave Hampton and Caleb Chung. They developed the Furby in 9 months and they spent an additional 9 months coming up with a design.They attempted twice to license the Furby concept until Richard C. Levy pitch the product to Tiger Electronics who would later show off at the American International Toy Fair. The initial sales price for Furby was $35 and became the must have toy of the 1998 holiday season. The resale price of Furbies was skyrocket to several hundred dollars as supply could not meet the demand. In a twelve month period, Furby would go off to sell over 27 million units. This would not be the last for Furby as it was rebooted in 2012 well extraordinary sells.
As for the technology behind it, it was a pretty advanced and complex toy for its time. They were pre programmed to only know their native language of furbish, which is a mixture of simple syllables and short words. As they “grow” and were played with, they would begin to “learn” the English language. Sadly to burst many bubbles, Furbies were already pre programmed with English words and phrases, and only begin to use these English words as time passes by. They did have microphones, but it was only use to react to monotonous beeps if a loud sound was made. Furbies have a many sensors in order to know how to respond, like for example sensor on it’s back to know that it is being pet thus it would start to purr. There are many complex gears that are driven by motors to make body parts like ear, eyes, etc move or even dance. Furbies also have IR sensors above their head to be able to communicate with other Furbies.
Furbies, although creepy, are very intricate and well made toys. They are able to survive a beating from many kids who use them as baseballs and are able to bring hours of joy to many kids. Also Furbies are such step up from tamagotchi.
FUNFACT: NSA ban Furbies in their offices due to securities concerns that they were "able" to record voices.
sources:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furby#History
Wow, great blog. I did not realize how intricate the technology of a Furby was. And that is a great fun fact!
ReplyDeleteYour title caught my attention, but once looking at the initial pictures, I could just tell what this blog would be about. This was a totally unexpected but totally interesting piece of obscure technology.
ReplyDeleteMan I remember the 2012 reboot and it still haunts me. As you already know my sister had one and I could hear it talk in the middle of the night from my room. Yeeesh! I would take tamagotchi anyday over Furby.
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