The Biggest Furby Myths That People Believed In
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How was Furby created?
David Hampton and Caleb Chung produced the Furby in around nine months (plus another nine months to design the toy).
That was the amount of time between Tiger Electronics' interest in his interactive creatures, during which Roger Schiffman acquired the rights, and when they hit shop shelves. Furby made his first public debut at the International Toy Fair in 1998. Furbys were originally priced around US$35 and sold out quickly in toy stores.
The demand for these toys during the 1998 holiday season pushed the resale price above $100, occasionally reaching several hundred dollars.
Learn more: Interesting Facts About Furby, How Many Generations of Furbys Are There?
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| Biggest Furby Myths That People Believed In |
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How many generations of Furbys are there?It includes eight generations, special editions, and contest rewards. There are several unreleased prototypes, some of which include prototype apparel. |
Myths about Furby
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1. Parents believed Furbys were teaching their youngsters foul words
The first successful attempt to manufacture and sell a domestically aimed robot, a newly purchased Furby, began speaking "Furbish," the distinctive Furby language. It gradually replaced Furbish with English words and phrases. Its speaking capabilities have been translated into 24 languages for the global market. A simple electric motor and a set of cams and gears closed the Furby's eyes and mouth, rose its ears, and lifted it off the ground to demonstrate its mobility. The toys were also programmed with specific responses to stimuli: teasing a Furby might cause it to kiss you, and if it was then touched, it was more likely to kiss you again in the future.
However, parents in the 1990s were unaware of this. One Boston-based radio producer told The Wall Street Journal that he continued getting calls from parents who complained "that Furby was picking up some of their foul language and repeating it in front of the children." In 2000, a Walmart in Pennsylvania withdrew certain Furbys from its shelves after buyers reported that the toys were cussing like sailors. Apparently, "hug me" sounded much filthier.
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| Fact: Because the Furby is a toy and cannot learn English, there was no way it could pick up or repeat swear words to children. Few toys have inspired as many tales as the Furby, and the notion that they were listening and learning based on what they heard humans say resulted in their ban from numerous intelligence organizations' headquarters. While many individuals like bringing toys or mascots into the workplace to brighten their day, there were (unfounded) concerns that the Furby could be a spy. |
2. People believed Furbys could launch a space shuttle
The general population grossly misjudged how advanced these gadgets were. Furbys possessed sensors that allowed them to respond to light, movement, and touch; they could also connect with other Furbys via an infrared communication system, which was considered quite advanced at the time. Although the technology was hardly earth-shattering, it did spark a lot of false stories and conspiracy theories. "I've been told that we're developing a Furby that can drive a car by the year 2000," Roger Shiffman, president of Tiger Electronics, a Hasbro company, told CBS in 1999. "We've also been informed that the present Furby has the capability to launch the space shuttle. We have one woman who is adamant that her Furby sing Italian operas.
3. Furby could be a spy
A common myth is that the Furbies repeated what was said around them. Consumers believed that Furbys had built-in recorders that could repeat audio. Many people were unaware that the toy was pre-programmed to say these things aloud regardless of what was said to it. Because the usage of sensors in the toys were new technology and seemed unusual at the time, most people and some federal agencies did not comprehend how the technology worked, and made erroneous assumptions without actually performing an autopsy on the animal to see how it truly operated.
The proprietor of Tiger Electronics, the toy's manufacturer, publicly said that the device could not record anything. The firm really issued a statement saying, "Furby is not a spy." Despite the company's explanation, many people feared the Furby. In one strange case, a woman in Waldorf, Maryland, called the sheriff's office after discovering a suspicious item on her front doorstep. The parcel, with an out-of-town return address that the woman did not recognize, continued to buzz and hum. The sheriff's deputies were afraid to open it, so they contacted the bomb squad. When the team opened the present, they discovered a furby inside. Crisis averted!
| Fact: As press stories on the Furby's risks spread, a spokeswoman for Tiger Electronics, the company that manufactures the cuddly toy, said the latest Furby controversy was simply a massive misunderstanding. She claims that many presume Furbys have recording devices merely because the dolls react to light, touch, and sound and appear to learn English. As the toy's popularity waned, so did fears about its ability to disrupt flights and collect sensitive information. |
4. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) believed Furbys would interfere with flight equipment
Around the same time that national security officials were discussing the prospect that Furby was a foreign spy, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was working to protect Americans from a Furby-led hijacking. Travelers were barred from using CD players and laptop computers during takeoffs and landings, and the FAA quickly added Furbys to the list of prohibited items. At the time, it was thought that Furbys might interfere with the plane's electronics. Speaking to CBS in January 1999, one airline safety consultant stated he thought the new protocol was a little severe. "I can just see the announcement being made: 'Turn off your laptops, put away your Gameboys, and don't play with your Furby,'" said he.
5. People worried Furbys would cause medical equipment to malfunction
Furbys were banned in several wards of a Scottish hospital due to concerns that the toys' low-level electromagnetic emissions would interfere with medical instruments. (One dean at the University of Calgary voiced concern that Furbys could confuse voice-activated medical equipment: "Let's say the Furby hears the doctor saying 'begin procedure 305' or something like that," stated the dean. "[The Furby] plays it again and all of a sudden you find radiation is being shot into some poor person." )
In response, the Emergency Care Research Institute performed an inquiry, which revealed no such hazard. The Canadian government's health ministry conducted a similar investigation and came to the same conclusion. The latest research "revealed that the electric and magnetic fields given off by the ear wiggling, eye blinking, fuzzy creature are about 70 times weaker than those emitted by a digital telephone and are 'very unlikely' to affect the performance of medical devices."
6. People believed Furbys were made of actual cat and dog fur
As if a wide-eyed, incoherently muttering, Gremlin-like monster wasn't frightening enough, rumors circulated in the late 1990s that Furbys were covered in real pet fur. Someone went to the bother of creating a phony Humane Society press release, claiming that Furby samples "tested positive for feline and canine DNA." The message, which chastised the Furby creators for animal cruelty, was distributed to several media sources. The animal welfare organization had to issue a statement clarifying that it was not behind the previously publicized statement. Tiger Electronics also had some explaining to do. "It's 100 percent acrylic," a company spokeswoman stated of the toy fur. "Yep, a lot of acrylics were killed in the name of Furbys."
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