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Buckyballs Throws In the Towel
RenderSeven writes "As previously reported the immensely popular Buckyballs office toys have been targeted by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Last week Maxfield and Oberton, the maker of Buckyballs gave up the battle and announced they would discontinue sales and close. However, being driven out of business is not enough for R Buckminster Fuller's estate, who has filed yet another lawsuit that they own all rights to the name "buckyballs" despite widespread use of the term. If you still haven't bought your own yet, a few thousand sets in stock are still available."
The company I work for bought everyone on our team a set. Probably worst investment ever. Productivity has definitely suffered. But look at my cool artistic design!
... on eBay, and you will find multiple vendors selling exactly the same thing, but not called buckyballs. They still exist - just not under that stupid name.
Dammit, freedom isn't free. And if the price of my freedom to be entertained by buckyballs is measured in the lives of toddlers, so be it. And now, I think I'll go outside for a nice game of Jarts. Who wants to be goalie?
I am a baker and normal dragées just don't work the same.
I don't see how kids can swallow these, not with their guts full of washing machine gel packs.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Oh, look, the State destroying a business and free choice in the first part of the summary and then the State enabling people to harass other people over imaginary property in the second. Thank goodness they're around to keep things civil.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
So if you want rare earth magnets before they're officially banned, get them from zenmagnets.com. Cheaper and higher quality. Also, they're not jerks like the buckyballs guys are.
Fun video here comparing the two http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7Tka4NUmUo
I know it looks like an advertisement posting, but as someone who owns a crudload of rare earth magnets, zenmagnets seem to me to be the best. I keep a mandala set on my desk at work for downtimes, and I have a manager who keeps trying to make the perfect soccer ball when I'm not looking.
- and if you get the colored ones, just beware - the color tends to come off very easily if you're rough at all with them. You've been warned.
magnets.. bad.
Guns, assault rifles, knives, mace spray, tazers, baseball bats, and realistic 3rd person shooters... good.
Glad you guys have got your retail priorities straight and are protecting your kids so well.
"Oops, I always forget the purpose of competition is to divide people into winners and losers." - Hobbes
we have to protect another child on behalf of the parents not capable of using good common sense.
We need to stop making scissors of all kinds, stop the production of any toys that a small child might play with but not marketed to them, and even take kids balls away because someone might get hurt.
Stupid people doing stupid things... being going on for millenia, and every effort to stop them has failed.
Zen Magnets hasn't yet caved to the CPSC.
Still interested in starting a small business in the US?
Didn't think so....
Starting a small business in the US today is less like reaching for your dreams and more like Running Man where you get a 30 minute head start before the death lawyers start chasing you...
Actually 12 year olds are a decent size group that is eating these. They use them to simulate tongue, cheek and labret piercings.
Limiting it to 18 plus might stop some of those idiot preteens. It would also make it more clear that these products have some level of danger involved.
WARNING
Keep Away From All Children!
Do not put in nose or mouth.
Swallowed magnets can stick to
intestines causing serious injury or death.
Seek immediate medical attention if
magnets are swallowed or inhaled.
It says right on the little plastic container that this isn't for children. The cardboard retail box gets torn up and thrown away, so I can understand a label on that *possibly* not being enough. The inner plastic cube is pretty explicit too, though.
There are a handful of stupid people somewhere out there, so bureaucrats close down a business that I like and decide that I can't have something that is of no risk to me or anyone around me. Gotta love this world we live in.
It's not the fault of the product when parents don't supervise their children and allow them to eat random household objects.
And I realize its not easy. Parenting is hard. If you're not up for it, don't have kids.
This is an adult product. It says it on the box. It shouldn't be required to meet child toy standards.
Oh, wait, now you say 'I meant injuries not deaths'. OK lets play that one:
There are approximately 2.2 million Buckyball magnet sets in circulation, and as each set has 216 magnets, there is a grand total of 475.2 million individual magnet pieces. This equals to approximately 1 injury per 100,000 Buckyball sets and less than 1 injury per 21.5 million individual magnet pieces.
Dogs are statistically over 120 times more dangerous
Tennis injuries are 1,228 times more dangerous
Soccer, Cheerleading, poisoning through common household chemicals are all over 1,000 times more dangerous.
Skateboarding is 890 times more dangerous.
Pools, cars, kitchen knives, firearms, balloons, snowblowers are all statistically more dangerous than Buckyball magnets.
That is a LOT of fails by your criteria. Yet where is the CPSC outrage on dogs, racquets, soccer balls, draino, skateboards, pool life jackets, ginsu knifes, and so on?
They added the warnings the agency asked them to. Do a bit of research before accusing people of lying. For more than two years, the packages have had strong warnings as required by the CPSC.
Mind showing the left side of that package, or would such honesty interfere with your agenda?
http://www.getbuckyballs.com/blog/wp-content/themes/buckyballs/images/xblog-graphic.jpg.pagespeed.ic.KAJoHdy4ZS.jpg
http://images1.vat19.com/covers/large/buckyballs-standard.jpg
http://sale.images.woot.com/Maxfield___Oberton_216_Piece_Magnetic_Buckyballs_Set___2_PackuhdDetail.jpg
http://www.wired.com/geekmom/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/orig_box_with_case-350x486.jpg
http://alyssaroyse.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/screen-shot-2012-09-20-at-4-42-56-pm.png
http://media.oregonlive.com/themombeat/photo/11374268-large.jpg
http://ds_product_photos.s3.amazonaws.com/large/16261.jpg
Same exact packaging you show. Except in these pictures you can see the left side of the packaging more easily. The warning is pretty obvious to me.
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We used to buy Magnetix. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetix
They were great fun...simple...self assembling, but you could do some fun things. It seemed like a great toy for kids. After we had gathered a sizable collection, we heard about the warning of swallowing the magnets. Coincidentally we also started noticing the magnets falling out of their plastic housings.
So, we heavily increased the supervision as the kids were playing with them. Made sure to keep everything glued in tight and or disposed of. Basically I guess that means I'm a responsible parent.
In the end though, we stopped buying them and switch to a toy that was less hazardous. That means the warning effectively became a ban ...for my house...
I think that's how it should work with pretty much everything.
--Welcome to the Realm of the Hawke--
Why the hell can't people take personal responsibility for their mistakes?
Because they don't.
They never have, and they never will. No matter how much naive libertarians wish for it.
It's not naivete. We don't think they will. We just want them to pay the consequences for not doing so, instead of making the rest of us pay.
If give a bunch of supermagnets to your kids, don't supervise them, don't teach them about the dangers, and then they swallow a couple and die...congratulations: You just paid for being a dumbass with the life of your child. Why do I have to give up my magnets as well?