Fingerlings (toy)

Fingerlings are a toy line made by WowWee that is meant to be wrapped around your finger. The toy is a robotic monkey, unicorn, or sloth that clings to your fingers and react to touch and sound by blinking and blowing kisses.[1] In 2018, WowWee released[2] Fingerlings Hugs in the for the Holiday season. The interactive plush toy is much bigger than the original Fingerlings, but have the same interactivity. The Fingerlings Hugs monkeys have long arms that kids can wrap around themselves.

Features

Fingerlings are capable of over 40 different sounds and reactions, including singing, blink, burping, and farting. With built-in microphones and motion sensors, they react differently depending on how you interact with them.[1] They were designed to resemble the pygmy marmoset, an animal that Sydney Wiseman, WowWee's brand manager and niece of the company's owners, has been "obsessed" with since childhood.[3]

History

Fingerlings were released in the UK and Canada in the spring of 2017. They launched in the United States in August 2017, where they exploded in popularity. WowWee created exclusive products for major retailers—a glitter-covered monkey for Amazon.com, the sloth for Walmart, and a unicorn for Toys "R" Us.[1]

Controversy

The toy became the #1 toy for Christmas 2017.[4][5][3] Online shopping bots, known as "Grinch bots", rapidly purchased bulk orders of Fingerlings from retail websites and sold them on secondary marketplaces like eBay and Amazon.com for a much higher price.[6]

U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer noticed the trend and stated, "Grinch bots cannot be allowed to steal Christmas, or dollars" and proposed legislation that would ban bots on retail sites, expanding the existing Better Online Tickets Sales Act (BOTS Act), which already prohibits bulk purchasing concert or theater tickets.[7]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 Montag, Ali (25 December 2017). "Can't figure out Fingerlings? This season's hottest holiday toy craze is actually a pretty sophisticated robot monkey". CNBC. Retrieved 20 February 2018.
  2. ↑ "Hugs - WowWee Fingerlings". WowWee Fingerlings. Retrieved 2018-08-31.
  3. 1 2 Corkery, Michael (9 December 2017). "How the Fingerling Caught On (Robot Grip and All) as 2017's Hot Toy". The New York Times.
  4. ↑ Montag, Ali (16 December 2017). "Fingerlings are selling out everywhere—here's how a 28-year-old engineered the viral toy frenzy". CNBC.
  5. ↑ White, Martha C. (September 8, 2017). "Meet Fingerlings, the Adorable Robot Monkeys Poised to Be the Holiday Season's Hottest Toy". Money.
  6. ↑ Thompson, Derek (14 December 2017). "The Most 2017 Story of 2017". The Atlantic. Retrieved 20 February 2018.
  7. ↑ Raphelson, Samantha (5 December 2017). "'Grinch Bots' Attempt To Steal Christmas By Driving Up Toy Prices". NPR.
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