Everything You Need to Know about the Rubik’s Cube

The Rubik’s cube has been in existence since the mid 1970’s. This famous toy was named after its inventor Erno Rubik.

Each cube is made up of 6 sides each has a distinctively different color. There have been a number of different color cubes released in the later years but the original colors (orange, yellow, green, white, red and blue) remains the norm. Sounds simple enough doesn’t it? The answer will surprise you.

The inventor Rubik first had it released in his home country Hungary where it was a huge success. Convincing the authorities to let him market his clever puzzle to the rest of the world proved to be a daunting task at first, but he was finally granted the patent to do just that.

This was just in time for the dawning of the 1980′, and it was such a massive hit that by the end of 1983, a total number of 100,000,000 units had been sold. The interesting thing about all these sales statistics is that the majority of these toy puzzles went on to remain unsolved.

It is estimated that at least one in every 8 people in the world has had an encounter with one of these cubes. The degree of distribution of the toy since its introduction makes it one of, if not the most famous puzzle toys of all time. Solving it takes a high level of concentration coupled with patience and mental fortitude.

The difficulty aspect of this puzzle is so high that the possible numbers of wrong moves are unquantifiable. This is why most people gather that calling it a toy does not accord it fair justice. The people who have managed to solve this puzzle testify that at first the whole experience is usually frustrating. When interviewed, they always cite their growth in skills stemming from an interaction they had with the cube while growing up or at some early stages in their lives.

To a normal human being, the cube may take days on end without making any significant progress. This could be due to the fact that regular people do not understand that there is a formula to solving this famous puzzle. How is it that the world record for the fastest Rubik’s cube solving is 5.66 seconds? The answer is speed cubing, this is where people try to solve the puzzle as fast as possible. And they used so-called algorithms, which are sequences of moves to be memorized in order to solve a specific part of the problem.

The world record holder, Feliks Zemdegs is one such fan of the speed cubing techniques. The cube’s impact on the world was so tremendous that it has been made into a sport. This is where enthusiasts of the cube get to compete trying to outdo each other.

Speed cubing involves a large category of disciplines. There is an event that seeks to determine the best competitor by having them solve a series of cubes in short time. Times from each cube are tallied and the one with the least recorded gets the tag of “best in the world”, at least till the next competition is held. There is also a blind folded class where participants compete as well.

All this continued interest has effectively ensured that the Rubik’s cube remains a relevant and integral part of our society and culture. It is a great games for kids, who can learn eye hand coordination, geometry, mathematical sequencing and much more.