WEBVTT - How Toy Testing Works 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:04.600 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works 0:00:04.600 --> 0:00:13.560 dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. 0:00:13.600 --> 0:00:16.639 There's Charles w Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry rolling in there, 0:00:16.680 --> 0:00:19.880 and this is stuff you should know for all the 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:24.520 kiddies out there. For the cats, the kiddies, there was 0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:27.840 a D d oh, two d s and an I E. 0:00:28.040 --> 0:00:35.920 Not no, not the nice call back man. Yeah, that 0:00:36.000 --> 0:00:38.720 was a good one, Bass Salts. Probably shouldn't mention that 0:00:38.720 --> 0:00:44.519 on the one for the kiddies. Uh, Chuck, Yes, have 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:50.000 you ever tested a toy? Um? No? Did you ever 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:52.440 want to? Well? Yeah, I mean I've done some product 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:57.960 testing before because I have a friend or had friend 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:00.880 that worked in market research and she would occasionally hit 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:04.039 me up for a burger taste or a beer drink 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:09.240 or a tool test, but never toys. Wow, I'll bet 0:01:09.240 --> 0:01:11.520 the beer drink was fun. That's great, drink a little 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:13.520 beer and you get paid like a hundred bucks. But 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:15.400 she's like, no, no, you can't swallow. You have to 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:18.120 switch it around in your mouth and spit it out. Actually, 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:19.720 most of the beer one is the only one I did. 0:01:20.760 --> 0:01:22.160 I think there was only one that was a taste 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:23.720 a lot of times it's just like, what do you 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:26.600 think of this logo type of thing? Oh? Really? So, 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:28.559 like the beer wasn't even in the room with you? 0:01:29.560 --> 0:01:31.679 What a tease? Yeah? They just throw things up and 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.160 I just go boring. Yeah where you like, you probably 0:01:35.160 --> 0:01:37.080 could have explained this better when you asked me to 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:40.320 test the beer. Well you get that little envelope with 0:01:40.319 --> 0:01:42.600 a hundred bucks? Also, who cares? Oh nice? Is that 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:46.920 how much that pays? Sometimes more sometimes fift. I did 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:51.360 a frozen yogurt one for fifty bucks one time, but 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:54.720 it ranged between fifty and a couple of hundred. Very cool. 0:01:54.960 --> 0:01:57.720 Yeah cash money? Yeah, why not? You know you can 0:01:57.720 --> 0:01:59.920 go buy a lot of beer with that. Totally well. 0:02:00.200 --> 0:02:03.360 I remember hearing about the idea of toy testing as 0:02:03.360 --> 0:02:05.640 a kid and just being like, how how do I 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:08.120 do this? My parents are like, I don't know, we 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:10.760 both work, we're busy to go be a latch key kid. 0:02:11.400 --> 0:02:16.160 Especially after the movie Big Oh. Yeah, there was like 0:02:16.200 --> 0:02:18.520 a lot of toy testing in that right, Yeah, I 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:20.600 mean that was his job, and I forgot about that, 0:02:21.000 --> 0:02:23.440 totally forgot about that. I just remember the piano scene 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:27.680 and then the scene at the end, Well, don't spoil it. Okay, 0:02:27.840 --> 0:02:29.920 I didn't. I said the scene at the end hopefully 0:02:30.000 --> 0:02:32.839 didn't spoil it for anybody that big ends eventually. Yeah, 0:02:32.880 --> 0:02:34.840 don't spoil it. But it has something to do with 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:39.600 it a dirty bomb, right, that's the next st episode, 0:02:39.720 --> 0:02:43.080 the big surprise ending. So anyway, I remember wanting to 0:02:43.080 --> 0:02:45.320 be a toy tester and it never panned out for me. 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:47.840 And now that I have grown up a little bit 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:50.160 and I've read this article, especially doing a little research, 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:53.680 toy testing still sounds awesome if you're a kid, but 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:55.960 if you're a parent, it does not sound all that great. 0:02:57.120 --> 0:02:59.280 What do you mean, like if your kid does that, Yeah, 0:02:59.320 --> 0:03:03.560 it sounds like a lot of work, man, Like getting 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:05.440 the toy and having your kid play with it. Yeah, 0:03:05.560 --> 0:03:07.680 I mean, it's not like that's the end of it. 0:03:07.760 --> 0:03:09.840 Like there's a lot of a lot of extra stuff 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:11.320 you have to do. You have to pay attention to 0:03:11.320 --> 0:03:14.680 your kid while they're playing with it. You have to uh, 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:17.359 you've got to write reports and stuff. There's like if 0:03:17.360 --> 0:03:19.240 there's work to it if you're the parent, for sure. 0:03:19.360 --> 0:03:20.760 So in other words, you have to take them out 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:24.639 of there. Uh, they're small plane brick room and actually 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:27.480 let them play, Yeah, take off their hannibal lector face 0:03:27.560 --> 0:03:30.280 mask and their straight jacket. I never thought about it 0:03:30.320 --> 0:03:33.799 that way to work, and then put them back in 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:38.160 after they were done with their toy. Um. No this again. 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:40.920 If you're the kid, great job. If you're a parent, 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:44.200 it seems tough. Plus also, one of the things that's 0:03:44.200 --> 0:03:47.119 tough about it is that this is not something that 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:50.560 UM is easily come by. I think, although it's a 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:54.080 lot easier today to get a job for your kid 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:57.880 as a toy tester than it was, say like in yeah, 0:03:57.920 --> 0:03:59.840 I think back then you had to literally depend on 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:03.160 someone getting in touch with you, right, or you had 0:04:03.200 --> 0:04:05.160 to like go show up at headquarters and be like, hey, 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:08.040 what do you think you kid? Huh? You know? All right, well, 0:04:08.120 --> 0:04:11.120 let's let's go a little further, a little further back, 0:04:11.840 --> 0:04:14.680 because there's a lot of different testing that goes on 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:17.440 with toys. There's the kind I was just talking about 0:04:18.080 --> 0:04:22.480 research market research, right, like you and your beer logos? Yeah, 0:04:22.480 --> 0:04:24.599 like playing with this toy, kid, what do you think stink? 0:04:25.480 --> 0:04:29.360 There's also the kind that UM that has to do 0:04:29.400 --> 0:04:32.960 with like actually making sure it's safe, which is another 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:36.520 kind of toy testing. And we're going to cover both. Um. 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:40.160 But the idea of testing toys to make sure that 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:44.080 they didn't you know, disembowel the kid that was playing 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:47.360 with them with some weird sharp edge or missile that 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:50.440 was actually you know, could would would stick in your 0:04:50.480 --> 0:04:53.400 gut and catch fire or something like that. That's actually 0:04:53.440 --> 0:04:57.880 a relatively new concept, like surprisingly new. Actually yeah, I 0:04:57.880 --> 0:05:02.600 mean toys have been around for thousands of years. Like 0:05:02.680 --> 0:05:05.280 they found toys that are potentially four thousand years old. 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:09.320 I saw a rattle that was from Turkey that maybe 0:05:09.320 --> 0:05:12.800 like four thousand years old. And by all accounts, this 0:05:13.480 --> 0:05:17.240 Italian find was a sort of like an early easy 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:21.480 bake oven kit. Yeah, it was like a toy kitchen 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:24.800 basically kitchen stead. Yeah. So, like little kids have always 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:27.200 wanted to play with stuff. It's just part of being 0:05:27.200 --> 0:05:31.359 a child. Whether it's took Took Jr. Or uh, you know, 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:33.760 all the way up to modern times. Uh. And in 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.280 the eighteenth century it became a thing to where the 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:40.880 Enlightenment philosopher said, you know what, learning through play is 0:05:40.920 --> 0:05:45.360 a really valuable thing. So, like legit toys started being 0:05:45.400 --> 0:05:48.120 developed for the first time. Yeah, I think this is 0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:51.479 about the time maybe a little before. But this is 0:05:51.480 --> 0:05:54.240 probably the seeds of where childhood came from, and we 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:56.640 need to do an episode just on childhood. I think, 0:05:56.680 --> 0:05:59.920 man like when it was allowed. Yeah, like, this is 0:06:00.120 --> 0:06:04.400 not it's not like a a natural. It may be natural, 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:09.640 but observing it is not a longstanding thing among humans. 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:11.599 It was like, well, you're five years old, time for 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:13.840 you to get to work. Exactly Like here you get 0:06:13.839 --> 0:06:16.080 a little more cold dust on your face. You look jobless, 0:06:16.760 --> 0:06:20.839 you know. So, Um, the idea of kids playing, especially 0:06:20.880 --> 0:06:24.080 to kind of learn and grow into adults. That that, yeah, 0:06:24.080 --> 0:06:28.120 that's like finds its roots in the Enlightenment. And so 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:30.960 you've got that that that one branch or that one 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.960 sapling coming up and it starts to integrate and merge 0:06:35.000 --> 0:06:37.160 with another one that comes up later on in the 0:06:37.240 --> 0:06:42.080 nineteenth century industrialization. Yeah, so now you have the idea 0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:45.920 that kids should play with toys because prior to industrialization, 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:48.919 families may have made them themselves. It may like the 0:06:49.040 --> 0:06:51.360 kid may have been just playing with a kitchen utensil, 0:06:51.440 --> 0:06:56.560 forced to use its imagination. Um. And I just realized 0:06:56.600 --> 0:07:00.760 it keep referring to the kid as it yeah, his 0:07:00.960 --> 0:07:05.440 or her imagination. Um, like a broom becomes a horse 0:07:05.480 --> 0:07:08.360 pretty easy. Yeah, or you know, I mean, look at stickball. 0:07:09.200 --> 0:07:12.280 Is there anything simpler than cutting a broom into a 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:17.720 broomstick and and playing baseball? Right? Or um, A a 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:23.120 nice ladle can become an electric guitar. Sure, that was 0:07:23.120 --> 0:07:25.320 always my thing. I always played air guitar or whenever 0:07:25.360 --> 0:07:28.960 I could, I would give entire God Man, when I'm like, 0:07:29.120 --> 0:07:32.920 now that I am older, how torturous must this have been? 0:07:33.080 --> 0:07:37.640 I would give entire concerts of like bon Jovi's Slippery 0:07:37.720 --> 0:07:41.360 when Wet, but like it would be an either air 0:07:41.400 --> 0:07:45.920 guitar or a drum set made of like country croc 0:07:46.600 --> 0:07:50.400 lids for symbols and then the tubs for the drum themselves, 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:52.040 or like a quicker Roads box or something like that. 0:07:52.080 --> 0:07:54.160 But I have like a whole like Tommy Lee drum 0:07:54.280 --> 0:07:57.160 kit made up. All right, I got some questions here, 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:01.360 I wasn't I wasn't done. I was on us there more. Yeah, 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:03.920 we give this whole concert, and like everybody would come 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:05.600 into my room and sit there and listen to like 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:07.240 the first song and be like, okay, one more, and 0:08:07.280 --> 0:08:09.160 I try to go through at least one whole side 0:08:09.160 --> 0:08:11.440 of the tape. Okay, I don't think I ever made 0:08:11.440 --> 0:08:13.240 it through a whole side, but my aim was to 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:15.520 do the whole album. All right, Well, that that answered 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:18.160 all my questions. Actually, Okay, I want to know how 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:23.480 long were these performances? Who you subjected them to? My family? 0:08:23.800 --> 0:08:27.680 And they were long, and they must have been excruciatingly long. Okay, Yeah, 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:31.280 that pretty much sums it up, right, So I'm not 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:34.320 even sure how I got on that. What my point was, Well, 0:08:34.360 --> 0:08:39.160 because of your imagination of turning household items into fantastical toys, 0:08:39.320 --> 0:08:43.760 that's right. So thanks to industrialization and mass production, toys 0:08:43.760 --> 0:08:46.319 could be made and sold and distributed, and all of 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:48.800 a sudden, now you have something like the beginning of 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:53.160 a consumer culture, especially in America. Yeah, and we're talking 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:57.520 nineteen fifties. It became a real thing. Except back then 0:08:58.160 --> 0:09:02.920 the toys were highlyly to injure or kill your child. Right, 0:09:03.760 --> 0:09:05.360 I'm not highly like it, but but a lot of 0:09:05.440 --> 0:09:08.240 them were pretty dangerous. But there, I found this one 0:09:08.320 --> 0:09:13.320 stat from nineteen sixty eight, and like I've seen it, 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:16.400 like question, no one was keeping track. Apparently no one 0:09:16.480 --> 0:09:21.200 really started keeping track two toy injuries and deaths until 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:26.560 like the twenty one century, isn't that jaw dropping? Man? 0:09:27.080 --> 0:09:31.199 UH century is when they started releasing reports with injury 0:09:31.360 --> 0:09:35.480 and death statistics from toys. So I saw this one. 0:09:35.559 --> 0:09:38.920 It was a guestimate, but I saw seven hundred thousand 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.840 injuries from toys in nineteen sixty eight. And that's not 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:48.479 including jungle gyms and swing sets, bikes, trampolines, probably scooters, 0:09:48.880 --> 0:09:52.839 nothing like that. These are just straight up toys. By 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:57.480 two thousand twelve, I saw that there were eleven children 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:01.679 who died in the US. Um five of them were 0:10:01.679 --> 0:10:05.480 from tricycles, two of them were from scooters, two or 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:09.680 from balloons. So really technically only two children died from 0:10:09.720 --> 0:10:12.319 what you would consider like just a straight up toy, 0:10:12.360 --> 0:10:14.520 like a dollar stuffed toy or something like a crane 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:17.800 or plato. I think both of them were asphyxiation. So 0:10:17.840 --> 0:10:22.680 the idea that there was this huge change from very 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:28.960 very very dangerous toys into actually a pretty safe industry 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:32.480 that has to do largely with toy testers. Yeah, And 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:37.040 it was that they finally passed what's known as uh while, 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:40.600 the first Federal Safety Standards for toys into law, and 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:44.840 then the National Commission on Product Safety that same year, said, 0:10:44.920 --> 0:10:49.720 all right, we've got eight recommendations for banning toys. And 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:52.160 I look these up in picture because they're they're kind 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:56.000 of fun to look at. The Empire Lady Empire Little 0:10:56.040 --> 0:11:00.560 Lady stove, which is basically an easy bake oven, uh 0:11:00.840 --> 0:11:07.280 mixed with a pottery kiln six hundred degrees fahrenheit. This 0:11:07.320 --> 0:11:11.439 thing would kit's sixteen degrees celsius like your home of 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:13.920 and doesn't get up to six hundred degrees. Probably it 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:17.200 genuinely does not. I think mine goes to five fifty. 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:20.319 Maybe in cleaning self cleaning mode it gets up that high. 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:23.400 But this is not something a little a little toddler 0:11:23.440 --> 0:11:25.720 needs to play with, right and self cleaning mode it 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:29.520 locks itself, shuts he can't open the door even uh 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:33.520 what else? The Bird of Paradise sling shot, which looked 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:37.560 um innocuous enough, but it uh. The deal with that 0:11:37.600 --> 0:11:41.319 one was that had these sharp missiles that could make 0:11:41.360 --> 0:11:46.000 you bleed. But yeah, I think sling shot it just 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:48.199 begins and ends at that as far as the safety 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:51.240 is concerned. I looked up sling shots today because I 0:11:51.280 --> 0:11:54.360 had remember the wrist rockets, Yeah, I do. Those things 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:56.880 were so dangerous did you have one? No, I was 0:11:56.920 --> 0:11:58.720 never allowed to have one, So I had a wrist 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:01.880 rocket And I looked up today after this article. I 0:12:01.960 --> 0:12:03.920 was like, I wonder, what what's going on in the 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:07.520 world of sling shots? And dude, you should see some 0:12:07.600 --> 0:12:09.559 of the sling shots on the market today. Are they 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:13.719 even more dangerous than the wrist rocket? Oh? Yeah? And 0:12:13.760 --> 0:12:16.960 like there are YouTube videos with people with these things that, 0:12:17.920 --> 0:12:21.959 uh they look like little musket balls that you can fire. 0:12:22.280 --> 0:12:26.160 And I mean this guy was shooting these balls with 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:31.960 a sling shot through like half inch plywood. It's like 0:12:32.000 --> 0:12:36.439 a gun that is a dangerous toy. Wow. Yeah, it's 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:40.440 it's really just look up extreme sling shots at some 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:45.360 point and uh and go get one. Yeah, if you're 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:48.320 eighteen year older and don't have like some you know, 0:12:49.120 --> 0:12:53.840 grudge against anybody. This last one, the Zulu blowgun. Um, 0:12:54.080 --> 0:12:57.000 was was that period in America where you could have 0:12:57.040 --> 0:13:01.120 some kid's toy that was highly raised, just in very dangerous, 0:13:01.160 --> 0:13:03.959 all in one one convenient box. Yeah. I can't imagine 0:13:04.000 --> 0:13:06.040 what the packaging looked like on that one. It looks 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:08.320 like what do you think it looks like? So um 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.640 kids were choking on the darts, I'm sure, like putting 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:15.439 the dart in then taking a deep breath exactly. They 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:18.079 were like, I should have thought this through first, pretty 0:13:18.120 --> 0:13:23.240 much no thing, and that was that, right, So that 0:13:23.240 --> 0:13:28.920 that was That was the first time they started taking 0:13:29.040 --> 0:13:33.160 toy safety seriously. And prior to that, the last time 0:13:33.200 --> 0:13:35.840 they had looked out for little kids was I think 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:39.120 in the fifties, because in the forties there was a 0:13:39.240 --> 0:13:44.440 lot of um like flash fire deaths among children wearing 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:48.240 like pajamas because pajamas were made of ray on, this 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:50.800 new material at the time, and I guess no one 0:13:50.800 --> 0:13:54.000 had ever tested it around a flame. And it turns 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:56.120 out that it could burn up real quick, and not 0:13:56.200 --> 0:13:58.760 only could it burn the kid badly, possibly to death, 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:02.960 it could also of them from smoke inhalation from their pajamas, right, 0:14:03.559 --> 0:14:07.319 And even if they survived, they were again very badly burned. 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:13.400 So Congress passed the flammable um not flammable. Flammable um 0:14:13.559 --> 0:14:16.480 fabric act, I think is what it's called, not flammable. 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.560 And can we can I go off here for a second, 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:24.760 can we all come together and just agree to drop 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:29.120 the word inflammable together. There's no reason for it. It's 0:14:29.160 --> 0:14:34.400 just a dangerous word. Uh yeah, I'm still I'm still 0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:38.960 beating the druma on that one too. Yeah, it's dr Nick. 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:44.760 He's like, flammable means flammable. Uh okay. So they so 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:49.160 Congress passed this Act to basically say all kids wear 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:53.400 UM needs to be flame retarded. Now, the problem is 0:14:53.400 --> 0:14:55.640 is the chemicals they used to make the close flame 0:14:55.680 --> 0:15:01.040 retardant was um. They were not. They were the opposite 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:04.600 of flammable in their credit, but they supposedly were linked 0:15:04.600 --> 0:15:08.720 to kids um an increase in hyperactivity and a decrease 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:13.520 in i Q. And still today it's very, very tough 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:17.960 to get kids pajamas that aren't flame retardant with those 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:21.760 same chemicals in them. But apparently in the mid nineties 0:15:22.040 --> 0:15:26.000 Congress allowed a loophole they keep going where if the 0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:30.640 pajamas were of a snug fit, they could be not 0:15:30.840 --> 0:15:33.080 flame resistant, right, they didn't have to have the flame 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:38.640 retardant chemicals because um, to to burn fire needs oxygen 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:41.600 and if there's no oxygen really between the kid's skin 0:15:41.760 --> 0:15:46.800 and the pajamas because they're snugly, snug fitting pajamas, then um, 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:49.040 the fire is probably not gonna happen. So they don't 0:15:49.080 --> 0:15:51.760 have to have flame retardant chemicals. That's the one loophole. 0:15:52.840 --> 0:15:56.080 Isn't that fascinating? Well, yeah, and now we can get 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.080 back to the long standing tradition of leaving a lit 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:01.600 candle in your baby's for the first month. Well, there 0:16:01.640 --> 0:16:04.440 was one other thing I saw, chuck too. There is 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:07.840 a long standing rumor that it was actually the tobacco 0:16:07.960 --> 0:16:12.160 industry that got the Flammable Fabrics Act pushed through because 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:16.440 they were trying to deflect the blame for um death 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:22.240 by fire accidental fire from cigarettes to the actual fabric manufacturers, 0:16:22.840 --> 0:16:24.880 even though a lot of people die in their beds 0:16:24.920 --> 0:16:27.480 from their mattress going up because they fell asleep with 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:30.960 a cigarette in their mouth. Smoking in bed it seems 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:34.520 like such a such a thing that nobody would do anymore. 0:16:34.520 --> 0:16:37.680 But I know people still do it, yes, but it's 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:40.200 still shocking when you see it in a in a 0:16:40.240 --> 0:16:43.560 movie or TV show, which I used to us see 0:16:43.560 --> 0:16:45.760 that all the time in movies, But now when you 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:49.040 see it, you think people really smoke in bed. I 0:16:49.080 --> 0:16:51.400 don't know. Yeah, I don't know either. I don't I 0:16:51.440 --> 0:16:55.080 don't smoke. All right, Well, let's take a break, um 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:56.960 and we will come back and talk a little bit 0:16:57.000 --> 0:17:22.120 more about different kinds of toy testing right after this. Alright, so, um, 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:27.200 there are mechanisms in place and regulatory bodies in place 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:30.800 now that are in charge of making sure toys are safe, 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:33.800 and these are constantly It's not like they wrote the 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:36.160 book on it and said all right, we're good. Um, 0:17:36.200 --> 0:17:42.359 as toys expand and are developed, the safety standards need 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:45.640 to be changing all the time, and they do, which 0:17:45.680 --> 0:17:49.760 is great. So um. One thing I saw, ironically enough, 0:17:49.800 --> 0:17:51.879 is that somebody actually did write the book on this. 0:17:52.920 --> 0:17:56.360 Well yeah, but it's not a finalized version, right Oh yeah. 0:17:56.440 --> 0:17:58.879 See do you mean like they updated as new science 0:17:58.920 --> 0:18:02.120 comes in? Yeah, yeah, agreed, agreed. Um. But even that, 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:05.399 you know, just the idea of creating standards again is 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:09.440 pretty new because I think until like the nineties, Um, 0:18:09.600 --> 0:18:13.800 they they didn't really update the toy safety requirements for 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:15.600 a while. It started to finally pick up, I think 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:18.040 in the nineties, and then in the two thousands there 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:21.560 is a group, um, an organization called a st M. 0:18:22.000 --> 0:18:23.879 Could not for the life of me find what that 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:28.880 stands for, but they created the Standard Consumer Safety Specification 0:18:28.960 --> 0:18:34.879 for Toy Safety, which apparently is the universal guidelines for 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:41.359 toy safety, American standards for toy manufacturers. Maybe that's not bad, Chuck, 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:43.960 all right, that was my first stab at it. That's 0:18:43.960 --> 0:18:47.280 pretty good. Uh. You also have companies like in our 0:18:47.400 --> 0:18:50.960 article here at how Stuff Works called Intertech, not in 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:53.879 a tech? What's in a tech? I think that was 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:58.520 office space, wasn't it? Oh? I think so um Interchech, 0:18:58.640 --> 0:19:04.399 which basically they they're professional toy testers. They have laboratories 0:19:04.400 --> 0:19:08.280 where they have technicians that say, here, let me um, 0:19:08.359 --> 0:19:10.400 let me see if I can bite the eyes off 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:13.080 of this doll into my mouth, and let me see 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:15.119 if it's so small that I can swallow that I 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.719 let me rip it apart, let me light it on fire. Uh. 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:21.960 In England they have I think actually not even just 0:19:22.000 --> 0:19:25.520 England and all of Britain. They they have a rule 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:28.200 that a toy burn rate can be no more than 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:31.199 one inch per second, with the idea that if a 0:19:31.280 --> 0:19:33.880 toy does catch on fire, at least your kid has 0:19:33.960 --> 0:19:37.200 enough time to throw it away, throw it towards the 0:19:37.240 --> 0:19:41.280 gas can and run. And then the EU has their 0:19:41.280 --> 0:19:45.240 own set of standards too. So with that burn thing, 0:19:45.280 --> 0:19:48.680 I should say, at least if if a toy burns 0:19:48.800 --> 0:19:51.600 faster than thirty millimeters a second, which is a little 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:55.119 over an inch, um, then it can't be sold in 0:19:55.160 --> 0:19:59.240 the EU. Right. And then if it burns between ten 0:19:59.320 --> 0:20:03.040 millimeters second in thirty millimeters a second, it still has 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:07.119 to have a warning that says warning, keep away from fire, 0:20:09.800 --> 0:20:12.159 right right? Um? And yeah, the whole idea is like, 0:20:12.200 --> 0:20:13.960 if the kid sees the thing on fire, they're gonna 0:20:14.000 --> 0:20:16.040 throw it and run and the household kitch on fire. 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:18.399 But the kid's not gonna burn up, right unless the 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:20.600 kid goes and tells the grown up. I think that 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:24.960 should be in the in the warning too, Throw doll, run, 0:20:24.960 --> 0:20:28.960 tell grown up, right, don't go make like a ham sandwich. 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:33.639 I saw this really great video from inter Tech and uh, 0:20:33.680 --> 0:20:37.480 it's called Teddy Bear testing. Did you see it? It 0:20:37.680 --> 0:20:41.520 is great. It's that they clearly are aware of what 0:20:41.600 --> 0:20:45.399 that what they're doing is bizarre and morbid if you 0:20:45.560 --> 0:20:48.080 just start standing there watching it as an observer. But 0:20:48.240 --> 0:20:50.639 you know, the point to the whole thing is actually 0:20:50.720 --> 0:20:54.440 quite quite noble and heroic. But one of the things 0:20:54.480 --> 0:20:59.359 that they did was there's this like three pronged It 0:20:59.440 --> 0:21:01.520 was almost like you know those things that a jeweler 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:05.679 uses to pick up diamonds with tweezers kind of. But 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:07.920 they have one that's like a three pronged thing where 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:10.080 you push down on the end and the prongs extend 0:21:10.119 --> 0:21:11.960 and open a little bit, and you pick something up 0:21:12.000 --> 0:21:14.720 and then release the end and it it draws it 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:20.120 up and tightens it and holds it. Snuck's that's gonna 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:21.880 be in the O E. D one day, I think. 0:21:22.400 --> 0:21:25.080 But with this that was a little bigger and much sturdier. 0:21:25.119 --> 0:21:28.359 And they hooked the dolls, the teddy bears I to 0:21:28.440 --> 0:21:31.800 this thing and then pull the teddy bear back to 0:21:31.920 --> 0:21:34.240 see how many pounds of pressure it could be saying 0:21:34.240 --> 0:21:36.359 before it came off. And that's the other thing too. 0:21:36.359 --> 0:21:38.760 They're not just like pulling this and like having fun 0:21:38.800 --> 0:21:42.040 like they're they're making measurements and they're using like standardized 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:46.440 um like force that they're applying to this, right, Like 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:49.920 the the seems the sewing has to um be able 0:21:50.000 --> 0:21:53.840 to withstand like one kilogram of wait for ten seconds 0:21:53.920 --> 0:21:56.760 without opening up. Just things like that, right, And it's 0:21:56.800 --> 0:22:00.680 thanks to these groups like the EU or the A S. T. 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:04.040 M and who who have gone through and said this 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:06.720 is like if your toy makes a sound, it should 0:22:06.720 --> 0:22:10.760 be no louder than this. Or if you are manufacturing 0:22:10.760 --> 0:22:12.840 a toy gun, it should be marked like this, so 0:22:12.880 --> 0:22:15.560 it's obviously a toy and not a real gun. Like, 0:22:15.800 --> 0:22:20.000 just comprehensive standards that everyone could adhere to to keep 0:22:20.040 --> 0:22:25.200 little kiddies two d's safe. I just think it's great 0:22:25.240 --> 0:22:27.200 that there's people out there doing that because it's a 0:22:27.320 --> 0:22:30.240 kind of a new thing. Well sure, and they ostensibly 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:33.560 have done the research on, like they really cover all 0:22:33.560 --> 0:22:37.520 their bases, like what what could we imagine a child 0:22:37.560 --> 0:22:42.280 doing with this thing? You know, I suspect that even 0:22:43.000 --> 0:22:46.879 as much time as they spend doing that, kids still 0:22:47.560 --> 0:22:51.280 come up with some black stuff to do with toys. Yeah, 0:22:51.320 --> 0:22:53.479 I mean, I told the story during the Evil Kneedl thing, 0:22:53.480 --> 0:22:57.800 we used to make uh coat hanger hoops and dip 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:01.399 them in gasoline to jump. I wish I would have 0:23:01.480 --> 0:23:03.240 known you back then so I could stand there and 0:23:03.240 --> 0:23:05.719 watch that. Man. Well you would have been putting on 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:08.040 your we would have been running the pyrotechnic for your 0:23:08.040 --> 0:23:11.040 bon Jovi concert. Oh wow, good thinking, Gott and I 0:23:11.040 --> 0:23:13.560 would have been all over that. You know, it's not 0:23:13.600 --> 0:23:18.560 too late, that's true. Um, all right, so that's toy 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:22.520 making sure toys are safe. Um. Once the toy is safe, 0:23:22.640 --> 0:23:25.120 then there's this whole second thing that we were kind 0:23:25.119 --> 0:23:28.560 of talking about from the movie Big. Um, like the 0:23:28.640 --> 0:23:32.760 great scene when Tom Hanks is first and uh, growing 0:23:32.800 --> 0:23:38.320 up Josh Baskin is in the office. What did you 0:23:38.359 --> 0:23:40.560 look up his name? Or do you just walk around 0:23:40.600 --> 0:23:44.240 knowing it? No? No, I know the movie Big Inside. Now, Wow, 0:23:44.359 --> 0:23:48.080