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Stuff You Should Know

Short Stuff: Magic 8 Ball

Stuff You Should Know

iHeartPodcasts

Society & Culture

4.582.7K Ratings

🗓️ 28 January 2026

⏱️ 13 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Magic 8 Ball, the mystical fortune telling pool ball started out as a piece of customer swag for the Brunswick Billiard Company.  Since then, it has changed the course of history and shaped nations.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

This is an I-Heart podcast.

0:02.6

Guaranteed Human.

0:08.2

Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff.

0:09.7

I'm Josh, and there's Chuck, and Jerry's here sitting in for Dave.

0:12.9

This is Short Stuff, and we're talking about the magic eight ball.

0:16.2

Probably know what that is.

0:18.8

We have one in our house, you know.

0:20.3

It's kind of one of those toys that I think most Gen Xers, and actually knowing how old

0:24.2

it is, probably boomers bought for Gen Xers, and now Gen Xers are buying for their alphas and

0:31.3

Zomers and I don't know where when they asked it in.

0:35.4

But this is the classic toy.

0:40.3

I assume most people have seen this,

0:42.1

but in other countries you may not know

0:43.5

what we're talking about,

0:44.4

but it is essentially a,

0:46.6

looks like a billiards ball.

0:48.3

It's about the size of a,

0:49.7

maybe a grapefruit.

0:51.6

And it's got a little flat side on, let's say, the bottom. And in that side,

0:58.3

it's got a little clear window with some dark liquid. And floating in that liquid is a 20-sided

1:04.3

dye with a bunch of answers to yes or no questions with the idea being that you ask it a question,

1:12.6

you shake this thing up,

...

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