Yo Yo Guy

January 28, 2004 9:06 AM

Infinite Illusions: Juggling Supplies, Unicycles, Yo-Yos and Tops.
posted by hama7 (8 comments total)

MetaAdvert??
posted by devbrain at 9:14 AM on January 28, 2004

See Also:

Airtraffic
Extreme Spin
Yoyo Play
and Dave's Skill Toys

...lest we be concidered Ad-filter.

As for tricks:

Yomania
Ken's World on a String
and Sector Y
posted by KnitWit at 9:18 AM on January 28, 2004

Now go get smarter
posted by KnitWit at 9:21 AM on January 28, 2004

I wandered into yo-yo guy's web of pages and related sites at some point and was pretty amazed; there's really tons of information in there, all over the place. Here is the site with tricks, for example, which is one of many sites that is "a part of the RPM Project" - I just can't figure out what the RPM project is.
posted by taz at 9:38 AM on January 28, 2004

I used to work for Duncan out in Middlefield Ohio (Amish country). The then-VP of Duncan (subsidiary) who invented the spring-axle yo-yo, now seen in many Yomega and Bandai models, often mentioned the unique "fad cycle" of the toy. It was about once every 7-10 years since the 30s. By my calculations we should be coming around to another... the last sales spike I recall was 1996.

One of his marketing strategies was to drop unpackaged yo-yos in school playgrounds so a couple of kids in the school would find them. In a week the rest of the kids had begged their parents to buy them one too. (just like "Bart the Lover" from season 3)
posted by greensweater at 9:40 AM on January 28, 2004

RPM: Revolutions Per Minute - fast spinning yoyos- String trick stuff would be my guess.
posted by KnitWit at 9:46 AM on January 28, 2004

It was the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (yo yo man) being brought back in 1988 that fueled my love of the yo-yo.
posted by Mick at 10:34 AM on January 28, 2004

For a bigger list of vendors try Juggling.org's mall.

Juggling is VERY well represented on the web, and always has been. Just a geek thing I guess.
posted by milovoo at 1:07 PM on January 28, 2004