rubik’s cube erno rubik

The Rubik’s Cube is a 3-D combination puzzle invented in 1974 by Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture Ernő Rubik. Originally called the Magic Cube, the puzzle was licensed by Rubik to be sold by Ideal Toy Corp. in 1980 via businessman Tibor Laczi and Seven Towns founder Tom Kremer. Rubik’s Cube won the 1980 German Game of the Year special award for Best Puzzle. As of January 2009, 350 million cubes had been sold worldwide,   making it the world’s bestselling puzzle game and bestselling toy.

On the original classic Rubik’s Cube, each of the six faces was covered by nine stickers, each of one of six solid colours: white, red, blue, orange, green, and yellow. Some later versions of the cube have been updated to use coloured plastic panels instead, which prevents peeling and fading. In models as of 1988, white is opposite yellow, blue is opposite green, and orange is opposite red, and the red, white, and blue are arranged in that order in a clockwise arrangement. On early cubes, the position of the colours varied from cube to cube.

An internal pivot mechanism enables each face to turn independently, thus mixing up the colours. For the puzzle to be solved, each face must be returned to have only one colour. Similar puzzles have now been produced with various numbers of sides, dimensions, and stickers, not all of them by Rubik.

1980s

Although the Rubik’s Cube reached its height of mainstream popularity in the 1980s, it is still widely known and used. Many speedcubers continue to practice it and similar puzzles; they also compete for the fastest times in various categories. Since 2003, the World Cube Association, the international governing body of the Rubik’s Cube, has organised competitions worldwide and recognises world records.

He Invented the Rubik’s Cube. He’s Still Learning From It.

The first person to solve a Rubik’s Cube spent a month struggling to unscramble it.

It was the puzzle’s creator, an unassuming Hungarian architecture professor named Erno Rubik. When he invented the cube in 1974, he wasn’t sure it could ever be solved. Mathematicians later calculated that there are 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 ways to arrange the squares, but just one of those combinations is correct.

When Rubik finally did it, after weeks of frustration, he was overcome by “a great sense of accomplishment and utter relief.” Looking back, he realizes the new generation of “speedcubers” — Yusheng Du of China set the world record of 3.47 seconds in 2018 — might not be impressed.

“But, remember,” Rubik writes in his new book, “Cubed,” “this had never been done before.”

1981

In the nearly five decades since, the Rubik’s Cube has become one of the most enduring, beguiling, maddening and absorbing puzzles ever created. More than 350 million cubes have sold globally; if you include knockoffs, the number is far higher. They captivate computer programmers, philosophers and artists. Hundreds of books, promising speed-solving strategies, analyzing cube design principles or exploring their philosophical significance, have been published. The cube came to embody “much more than just a puzzle,” the cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter wrote in 1981.

“It is an ingenious mechanical invention, a pastime, a learning tool, a source of metaphors, an inspiration.”

But even as the Rubik’s Cube conquered the world, the publicity-averse man behind it has remained a mystery. “Cubed,” which comes out this week, is partly his memoir, partly an intellectual treatise and in large part a love story about his evolving relationship with the invention that bears his name and the global community of cubers fixated on it.

“I don’t want to write an autobiography, because I am not interested in my life or sharing my life,” Rubik said during a Skype interview from his home in Budapest. “The key reason I did it is to try to understand what’s happened and why it has happened. What is the real nature of the cube?”

Stanisław Lem

Rubik, 76, is lively and animated, gesturing with his glasses and bouncing on the couch, running his hands through his hair so that it stands up in a gray tuft, giving him the look of a startled bird. He speaks formally and gives long, elaborate, philosophical answers, frequently trailing off with the phrase “and so on and so forth” when circling the end of a point. He sat in his living room, in a home he designed himself, in front of a bookshelf full of science fiction titles — his favorites include works by Isaac Asimov and the Polish writer Stanisław Lem.

He speaks about the cube as if it’s his child. “I’m very close to the cube. The cube was growing up next to me and right now, it’s middle-aged, so I know a lot about it,” he said.

“Here’s one,” Rubik said, retrieving it from the coffee table, then fiddling with it absent-mindedly for the next hour or so as we spoke.

The son of a poet mother and a glider-manufacturer father, Rubik studied sculpture at the Technical University in Budapest and architecture at the Academy of Applied Arts and Design, also in Budapest. While a professor of design at the academy, he pursued his hobby of building geometric models. One of these was a prototype of his cube, made of 27 wooden blocks; it took Rubik a month to solve the problem of the cube. It proved a useful tool for teaching algebraic group theory, and in late 1977 Konsumex, Hungary’s state trading company, began marketing it.

1984

By 1980 Rubik’s Cube was marketed throughout the world, and over 100 million authorized units, with an estimated 50 million unauthorized imitations, were sold, mostly during its subsequent three years of popularity. Approximately 50 books were published describing how to solve the puzzle of Rubik’s Cube. Following his cube’s popularity, Rubik opened a studio to develop designs in 1984; among its products was another popular puzzle toy, Rubik’s Magic.

If you want to know about “Where is the triceps?“, click on it.

The Museum of Modern Art selected Rubik’s Cube for its permanent collection. The first Rubik’s Cube World Championship was held in Hungary in 1982. The winner solved the puzzle in just 22.9 seconds.

Soon, Rubik’s Cube become part of pop culture.

Today, nearly 50 years after its invention, Rubik’s Cube is still a huge seller. Over 450 million have been sold – making it the best-selling toy in history. And the pandemic has boosted sales. The current speed record for solving Rubik’s Cube is just 3.47 seconds.

Which is mind-boggling – considering there are 43 quintillion possible combinations – but only one successful one. And just last year, the famous Cube was purchased for $50 million by the Canadian company, Spin Master Toys.

It is a unique and remarkable brand. Even in this computer-driven, digital age, Rubik’s Cube is projected to sell 20 million units this year alone.

He Writes A New Book: It’s Full Of Twists And Turns

Hungarian architect Ernő Rubik takes play very seriously — and suggests we could all lighten up. “Most people are taking most of the things too seriously,” he says. “They really can’t enjoy life because of that.”

If Rubik’s name sounds familiar that’s because he’s the inventor of the Rubik’s Cube — that fun (and frustrating) colorful cube puzzle.

“If you don’t really mind if you are winning or losing, you enjoy the play …” he says. “I learn most from my failures — that is the way to learn, that is the way to be successful.”

And Rubik knows a thing or two about success. He was obsessed with puzzles and solving problems as a kid. He invented the cube in 1974, and when it was first sold in Hungarian toy shops in 1977 it flew off shelves.

100 million copies

In the first three years that the cube was licensed to an American company, it sold 100 million copies around the world. Rubik never imagined it would have that kind of appeal. People tended not to buy difficult puzzles, he explains.