Fisher Price Chatter Telephone with Bluetooth

[fhd2]

I doubt anyone needs this, but I want to buy it just for the product description! It's full of gems, e.g. "Sort of sleek mobile design experience with colors, numbers, and wobbly eyes that will turn heads".

Can't tell if this is inspired by market research, or if someone at the company simply had the freedom to create something that's just fun. Kinda wish it's the latter.

[InsomniacL]

"A truly 'mobile' phone"

Phone has wheels

[omk]

I do feel this is market research inspired. The fact that it is sold out between Thanks Giving and Christmas. This makes a brilliant secret santa gift for offices, friends, family.

[retube]

"it makes both imaginary and real phone calls"

wonderful

[kryogen1c]

> I want to buy it just for the product description!

there is a product demo video that does not load on the mobile app i browse HN with. you simply must see it, it is nearly a work of art.

if they werent sold out i would buy 4 of them for nieces, nephews, and my WFH desk.

[mherdeg]

Oh yeah the text is charming:

> Bluetooth® range: 15 feet; Fun: unlimited

[krstffr]

"A real-working phone for a real adult desk"

[hashimotonomora]

Children love emulating what adults do. It’s how they learn and develop.

[Terry_Roll]

Actually this could be quite useful for parents who may have conditions like epilepsy or diabetes or something else where they could slip into states of unconsciousness or incapacitation. The kid could be taught from an early age to ring 911 or 999 or some other emergency number listed here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_emergency_telephone_nu... (what a anti-NWO list of numbers) and hopefully get the appropriate service just by using their Fisher Price phone. We read and hear about kids calling the emergency services all the time so I wonder how long before we get the first Fisher-Price mobile phone emergency call, which news organisations will be the first to run with it?

[nobrains]

:)

“Its intuitive bulky face design comes with a 'super-advanced' rotary dial”

[kingcharles]

I used to know someone that worked there and it always seemed like the engineers had a lot of latitude and enjoyed their jobs, so I'm guessing it bubbled up from the bottom.

[bayindirh]

If it was available here, I'd have ordered one today! Oh, the fun!

[linker3000]

My new washer-dryer (not as much fun as the telephone) has bluetooth ,and I can monitor and control it with an app ('Homewhiz')..

...that connects to a cloud server 'somewhere'.

...for which the app suppliers want: my location and access to my microphone, camera and contacts - and the app won't install or run if you start denying access.

Nope, not happening.

I wish I was more of a hacker/programmer because I'd like to do some protocol sniffing and create a connector for Node-Red so that I could link the appliance to my home automation system without becoming a personal data asset for the manufacturer.

[cr3ative]

Are you aware you're commenting on a nostalgic bluetooth kids phone which pairs to your mobile phone in the same way a headset does?

[MarkusWandel]

Phones should have fake permissions for this kind of thing. Suuure you can read my SMS. Oh, I never get any SMS? Well that's how it is. Mine my contact info? Oh, look at that, I have no friends.

[rjmunro]

I would hope this is just using bluetooth headset profile, and doesn't require anything like that. It really doesn't need anything else with the feature set as described.

[yeswecatan]

> I wish I was more of a hacker/programmer because I'd like to do some protocol sniffing and create a connector for Node-Red so that I could link the appliance to my home automation system without becoming a personal data asset for the manufacturer.

You may find this post (https://ptx2.net/posts/unbricking-a-bike-with-a-raspberry-pi...) inspirational.

[c7h]

Without knowing the App, but the location permission could be required for Bluetooth 4.X LE to work. That still doesn't justify why a dryer needs your phonebook.

[jhgb]

> for which the app suppliers want: my location and access to my microphone, camera and contacts - and the app won't install or run if you start denying access

Could these things be virtualized? And provide a fixed location, silent sound, and an empty contact list to whatever applications you don't trust?

[hdjjhhvvhga]

You are not the first person with this problem - fortunately smart people figured a way to fake all these data but it requires additional effort.

[eru]

If you are on Android, there are ways to give phones fake access to microphone, camera, contacts etc.

[TheRealDunkirk]

Why did you buy that washer and dryer? Surely there were non-"appified" versions available? You appear to hate the idea, but you just told that manufacturer that that's what you wanted.

[dr_dshiv]

Fisher-Price is doing amazing things these days. I don’t know what happened and I can’t find any press about it.

I got a Soothe’n’Snuggle for my 3 year old child and it is a full on sleep-inducing soft robot. It works. Very sophisticated for less than $40.

https://www.fisher-price.com/en-gb/product/soothe-n-snuggle-...

[OscarCunningham]

Last month HN was angry at them because the music box now only pretends to be mechanical: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29048819.

[entrep]

I don't know how Fisher-Price manage to get the quality they do. No other toys in our house come close to being as unbreakable. The cash register I played with in the 80's is still working just as well as it did back then.

[tomwojcik]

I just bought it for my 14 months old and Im not sure which combination is the best but the results are not as good as yours. Are you using only breathing or the sound and light as well?

[fy20]

How long does the battery last? I got a similar product Whisbear, and it needs to be charged every 2 days... We just took the electronics out and it seems to work just as well :D

[authed]

Why do they need to load javascrit from 9 domains though...

[ascar]

"... a phone smart enough not to come with any apps. Its intuitive bulky face design comes with a 'super-advanced' rotary dial..."

Love their marketing speak here :)

it actually seems to be made for adults with the Bluetooth connecting to the mobile phone for real calls.

[alx]

My custom phone shell in 2004: https://flickr.com/photos/alx/1491266/in/photolist-8Diu-4j1o...

[nakedgremlin]

Love the product video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKKFNV0m3SQ

"Bulky design" "Colors"

[codeulike]

Haha that's great

[Animats]

They actually built this as a volume product. I'm impressed.

I'm waiting for the Elf on the Shelf to become Amazon Ring enabled.

"He sees you when you're sleeping. He knows when you're awake. He knows if you've been bad or good..."

[krzrak]

"...he reports to headquarters".

[robbedpeter]

...And waits for you to get paid.

[waxdotrun]

"so buy now for goodness' sake"

[brap]

This is pretty cool, but I wonder if toddlers nowadays even understand what a cord phone is. After all, playing is often just mimicking adult behavior, and adults aren't using corded phones anymore, so to a child this might not be a fun toy. A cool toy for adults, though.

[allenu]

This is such a funny product. The original chatter telephone toy is one of my mom's favorite toys when she was a kid. She always brings it up and eventually found one at a garage sale to buy for herself. This would make for a funny Christmas gift seeing as you can use the handset for real.

[m12k]

Comes with speakerphone you say? I can only assume this will be ironically used in the conference room of some hip startup.

[kube-system]

I am very disappointed that I missed this when it was in stock. I needed a new headset for my most important meetings.

[borepop]

Holy shit, I have wanted exactly this product (minus the "child" styling) for years for my actual office, as a productivity tool. I just want to be able to take and make calls on my phone without being dragged into a vortex of tangential nonsense.

[beardyw]

I built an Ebay Bluetooth headset into a clunky kids mobile phone I got from a charity shop. Fun to use in public. Total cost £3.

[qwertox]

"Eyes". I love the teaser. But this would mean that the user would have to memorize the phone numbers again?

[wodenokoto]

For those reading just the headline:

Bluetooth is for making actual calls via your phone, just like a bluetooth headset.

This is aimed at adults.

[t0mas88]

Isn't the idea that your toddler can call grandma but without holding your actual $ 1000 iPhone?

[jinto36]

That description is amazing, it reminds me of Woot in the pre-Amazon era. Maybe they'll make more of them considering it seems like they probably already sold this first batch.

[i_love_limes]

I don't know how many people here have interacted with toddlers on phones, but I'm not sure this will take off.

The thing that kids love about communicating on mobile phones is video. They love to see themselves and love to see you. I would be very surprised if a 3 year old would prefer this over a WhatsApp video call / facetime.

[dddddaviddddd]

Battery life could be better. 9 hours of talk time seems pretty low compared to much smaller devices.

[helsinkiandrew]

For some reason it reminds me of this from a couple of days ago:

https://twitter.com/nikitonsky/status/1465247347550703618

[yodon]

Has anyone made a guide on how to move the guts of this into an actual old-school dial phone? I have an old rotary dial phone I've been wanting to turn into a Bluetooth extension as a project.