In my personal opinion, the My Keepon is what is wrong with Christmas. I don’t care what anyone else thinks. This is such a totally pointless toy that every time I see them I want to start stomping on them; watch their squishy yellow bodies scattered all over the Workshop floor.
Of course I was the most vociferous voice in opposition of adding electronics to the Workshop list to begin with, but Santa over-rode my objections. He was afraid that kids would stop needing him at all if we didn’t switch to the in-demand toys. What can I say? Even here at the North Pole, we have to move with the times.
I’m still trying to figure out why this is such a hot number on this year’s toy list. I mean, it’s just a ridiculous little yellow robot, and a dancing robot at that. You play your favorite music and thanks to a small microphone hidden in its nose it will dance with you in time to the music. Stupid right? Yeah, I know. I’ve watched this thing move to rap and pop and heavy metal and even Tibetan chants, it gets it right every time.
So what is the point of it? Well, it’s a toy after all, which means that it doesn’t necessarily have to have a point. That’s what toys are all about after all. As long as the kid gets a kick out of it (and it keeps the kid out of the parent’s hair for a good length of time) then it is considered to be a fair tradeoff, even if you never do figure out the point.
It doesn’t just dance though, it also responds to your child using chirps and small noises that sound like a distressed gerbil when confronted with a cat. It also responds to touch, which means that when your child touches it or gives it a gentle squeeze, it will turn and look in the direction of the touch (I don’t know about you, but this last added feature sort of creeped me out).
The yellow body of the Keepon is soft and flexible and has no particular form, unless you want to compare it to a rather thick and non-sticky gummy worm. However, this is a pretty sturdy gummy worm, in that it can take a lot of hard knocks before it shows any wear and tear.
The yellow gummy worm body stands up from a sort of black box or platform which is where the brains of the operation is kept. It is here that the music ‘heard’ by the microphone in the nose is converted into the dance master moves of the gummy worm body. This is especially good to know for those parents who find themselves just one more chirp away from a total nervous breakdown after listening to their kids interact with this annoying play buddy for weeks at a time.
But hey, it is the point of a toy for a child to play with it, and the My Keepon does just that, albeit in a rather creepy, gummy worm sort of way.
