I'd already been doing contact juggling by the time the fushigi came out, but the ads implied that you could just... perform a skill by buying their product. It'd be like a company marketing the "mystical multiball" that shows people juggling 7 objects and implying you too could do that if you only owned their particular set.
Oh yeah, I 'member. I opened mine super excitedly and was immediately disappointed that it "didn't work". I couldn't find any way to activate it. It then clicked that it was a regular ball the whole time and the people in the commercials were just skilled.