Tips to solving the Rubik's Cube
So you thinking of giving (or getting) a Rubik's Cube for the holidays but can't bear the thought of mountains of frustration heaped upon you when you discover you can't solve it. Help is here.
Tyson Mao is a champion speed-solver of the cube. So incredibly proficient at the puzzle, Mao was hired to be Will Smith's "cube coach" for the upcoming movie Pursuit of Happyness, in which the Rubik's Cube has a sort of starring role.
In an interview with Stuck in the 80s, Mao explains his attachment to the puzzle. "The attraction of the Rubik's Cube for me was being able to do something that was seemingly comprised of nothing more than mankind's purest forms of frustration," Mao says. "It was overwhelmingly addictive."
To Mao, the cube itself is "a beautiful toy."
"It's simple concept has a tangible place in the minds of today, as it did in the '80s," he says.
Mao solved it the first time in about two hours. These days, his times are anywhere from 16 to 18 seconds.
Tyson Mao's advice to Rubik's Cube novices:
- Start by watching: "You can learn a lot just by watching. Be observant of what's going on around the Rubik's Cube. If something works, think about why it works."
- Keep it simple: "When you solve a Rubik's Cube, you are placing pieces, and not stickers."
- Know how it works: "Recognize that the centers of the Rubik's Cube do not move and therefore they define the colors of the solved state. In other words, the side with the red center will be red when the Rubik's Cube is solved. There is no other choice."
Most important: Don't give up. "Many people have thrown their Rubik's Cubes away in frustration, or they have simply lost them due to negligence," Mao says.
Hey, that's no way to treat a piece of '80s history!
To see a video of Mao and other speed-cubers solving the puzzle, click here.
(Click here to read more on the resurgence of the Rubik's Cube.)
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The story about Rubik's Cube is tremendously American, yet completely Hungarian.
1974, during the Communist rule over Hungary. It wasn't produced until 1977 by Politechnika, a Hungarian toy company. Ideal Toys brought the toy into major production in September of 1978. In 1979, Seven Towns Ltd., a London-based company, worked with Ideal to market the toy. Finally, in May 1980, Rubik's Cube got its name and started to be exported from Hungary.
The rest is history.
http://www.hungarianbookstore.com/rubik.htm
Posted by: A. Trendl HungarianBookstore.com | December 02, 2006 at 12:24 AM
www.speedcubing.com
Posted by: hmm | December 02, 2006 at 01:59 PM
The Rubik's Cube is Cool! Solve the Rubiks!
Posted by: R | December 24, 2006 at 05:15 AM