Shoutout to the $15 fidget spinner I dug out of a drawer, it outlived every app that tried to copy its hype

Abby Martinez · 2026-10-19T14:05:04.168663+00:00

Found one in my junk drawer in Tucson last week while looking for a charger. Battery is dead on my phone, so I spun it for a while. Got me thinking about how that whole craze lasted maybe 6 months in 2017 and the toys are still sitting in drawers doing their job today. Meanwhile I downloaded 4 apps in 2019 that promised to replace it and all 4 are gone now, servers shut down, nothing left. The trend died but the dumb piece of plastic kept working. What viral thing from your house survived the hype just by being simple and cheap?

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Shoutout to the $15 fidget spinner I dug out of a drawer, it outlived every app that tried to copy its hype | After the Hype - Vivisector