My First Microchip
Sarah Hope Williams, io9.com: In the late 1970’s, the toy industry embraced technology as never before and contributed to the children of the 70’s and 80’s becoming a tech-savvy, science- (and science-fiction-) loving populace. Do you remember your first microchip?
Toys that talked, walked, and lit up like a disco floor dominated the toy chests of this era and shaped the ways in which kids interacted with the world. Saturday morning cartoons blared advertisements populated by talking Teddy bears, cyborg Barbies, and home video-game systems that paved the way for the tech toys of today.
One of my most frightening childhood memories is of a sleepover, when late at night, curled up in the bottom bunk, I heard a voice from the closet imploring me “Let’s be friends!” over and over… until the batteries finally wore out. This was before Furby, but not long after Gremlins, and I was petrified that some small fuzzy minion of Chuckie was about to emerge and murder me in my sleep.
Here are few toys that changed playtime forever…
