I have great news, you are today's winner of the "I Made It" Challenge for the month of june. Thank you so much for being a part of the instructables community and encouraging authors to post more projects!

For winning you are receiving a 3 month pro-membership.

http://www.instructables.com/community/June-is-I-Made-It-Challenge-Month-Win-a-Pro-Mem/

So much debate... yet nobody has answered if the components are particularly bad. The battery in my view is the only thing potentially harmful. But not all batteries contain heavy metals by definition. Lithium batteries contain, well, lithium and either manganese, copper oxide, or carbon. None of which are toxic. The led's are sealed in a plastic case, and the magnets are pretty innocuous. So Chill out! just don't get the mercury chemistry button cells... that have been made illegal for general use since 1997. If you are worried about energy used to make the parts here is a rule of thumb. --- If it is expensive it used a lot of energy. ---- Think about it for a few minutes and you'll see why. There's a few exceptions but you'll know it when you see it.

keep your hair on lolage totaly

but the leds wont be burnt out, just the batteies are. the batteris can go to a recycling plant, and the leds and magnets could be reused

Yep exactly! :P

Right.  Except that the whole idea is based on a "cheap, throwaway" philosophy.  How many of those "throwies" in the video do you think were recycled?  This is a bad idea at its very core.

but the idea is entertaining, you have to give him that

I give him that.  I repeat, not all entertaining, artistic, creative ideas are good ideas.  Taking a step back, as stated elsewhere, unless you are absolutely sure that the battery in any "Throwie" that you make is going to be recycled, don't make it.

Remember that even if the person making the throwies didn't make them, other people would have used exactly those same parts to build something else, and there, the chance of the batteries being recycled is still almost zero. If anyone uses them, the chance of the batteries being reused is next to nothing, so the batteries are a bad idea, not the throwies.

Hmm. No. You aren't thinking. Your logic justifies building anything made out of "exactly those same parts." Hell, why not build a nuclear warhead, if you don't do it, somebody else will, and we've got all the parts right here. I believe I said in the beginning, just because something is a great idea doesn't mean it should be built(like nuclear bombs). Obviously we aren't talking about something so dire, but the harm here is more insidious, because it does seem so harmless(and fun). We should not be manufacturing and using products which by their nature(i.e., human nature) will pollute(in this case in a fairly significant way). The little button batteries used in these "throwies) will almost certainly end up in the landfill(or worse), and they will leak heavy metals into the environment. If you want to make these toys with a total commitment to recycling the batteries when they are worn out, go right ahead. I saw a little video of people blithely tossing these things onto the side of a building where they were certainly not going to be recycled. Not to mention the trash left for others to clean up. The revolution starts with you.

what if someone made solar throwies? ones that charge during the day, and turn on at night?

I'm not sure about the pollution involved or how throwable they might end up being. My point from the beginning has been, "Clean up after yourself."

Sorry, but I've gotta butt in. I think people need to be more environmentally conscious and all that--conserve energy, stop using plastic bags, buy locally-grown foods, etc., but you have to pick your battles. There's no way to live completely without any kind of environmental impact. And trying to do so would take the fun out of life. The point should be living sustainably, which does mean you're allowed to consume resources and impact the environment, as long as you allow those resources time to replenish and the environment to recover. In the grand scheme of things, it's pointless to deny yourself throwies when you probably damage the environment far more just by commuting to work (especially if you fly regularly) or produce more toxic waste each time you throw away an old appliance like a fridge or TV. So instead of getting all up in someone's face about minor occasional environmental trespasses, concern yourself more with the regular industrial-scale pollution that most of us contribute to by living in a consumer society. Do you buy products manufactured in countries with poor industrial/environmental regulations? If so, fix that before blowing throwies out of proportion.

I'm not battling anybody. I'm just saying(this isn't rocket science), take responsibility for your actions. In this case, may I suggest as gently as possible, if you are going to throw "throwies" around, clean up after yourself. Do not leave them behind for someone else to clean up, and particularly, do not leave them, and especially their batteries, behind to break down and pollute the environment. It matters! It is not a matter of proportion, it is a matter of changing the way we think about our environment and how we fit into it.

OK, that's pretty reasonable. But that is different from saying throwies are a horrible idea, period . And when I say "pick your battles", I don't mean battling people; I mean battling environmental issues--e.g. crusading against any and all plastic products vs. crusading against the plastic products which are the main sources of pollution. So, for instance, I wouldn't make a big fuss about someone's artificial heart having a plastic component, but I am opposed to people buying bottled water in bulk when they could just purchase a water filter and get a non-disposable water bottle/thermos.

Fair enough.

1-2 weeks

Rub any sort of magnet over something that uses a magnetic strip to store data and you'll wipe it clean. The way the strips (or discs in the case of floppies) work is by arranging the particles a certain way. If you wipe a magnet over that you're basically realigning the particles and wiping the data. (correct me if I'm wrong on this one. It's been a whiles since I was told how floppy discs work.)

LEDs last a VVVVEEEERRRRYYY long time; but the battery (being a coin CO2032) likely won't. It said in the article ~2 weeks of life. DIDN'T YOU READ IT???

It really depends on the LED battery combination. Cube Throwies last up till three or four weeks. Blinking Throwies up to three month.

Did you actually just link to your own website trying to sell something based on someone else's design?

Hey, I was able to make 100 of these for under $0.30/each by getting all my stuff on ebay. only prob is it's mostly from china so shipping is kinda slow. But they make great party decorations and you can't find better decorations for the price I think!
P.S. I put some in clear and frosted balloons and then plow them up and tie and float 'em on my pool, they look awesome!

Right you are i bought some laser diodes from hong kong and waited for like 2 months for them to arive.