Through computer animation, বার্বি has become the তারকা of several feature films, including “Barbie in the Nutcracker,” “Barbie as Rapunzel,” “Barbie of রাজহাঁস Lake” and “Barbie as the Princess and the Pauper.” And she has staked her claim on the Web with the জনপ্রিয় Make Up বার্বি Game, which allows girls to alter her hair, makeup and সামগ্রিক look.

In the late 1990s, computer technology boomed, and in 1996, Mattel launched www.barbie.com, the official বার্বি website. In 1998, “My Design” was introduced on the site, allowing girls and collectors to decide what their বার্বি doll friend would look like দ্বারা choosing her hair/eye/makeup colors, fashion, accessories, and personality traits.

And Barbie’s reach has extended still further, to the vast sub-cult of adult বার্বি worshippers, those grownups who collect, display, buy, sell and for whom the words “mint in box” have a freighted significance. Today, বার্বি Collector has a website all its own, www.barbiecollector.com. The collector line now even has a dedicated online store at www.barbiecollectiblesstore.com.

Mattel estimates that there are আরো than 100,000 active বার্বি collectors, 90 percent of whom are women with an average age of 40. Forty-five percent of them spend আরো than $1,000 a বছর on their dolls. Vintage বার্বি পুতুল are the most valuable: a mint-in-box from 1959 sold for $3,552.50 on eBay in October 2004. (It originally sold for $3.)

The highest price so far to be paid for a বার্বি was at a Christie’s auction in লন্ডন on Sept. 25, 2006. This was a 1965 বার্বি dressed in Midnight Red, which had been part of a private collection of 4,000 বার্বি dolls. The বার্বি was sold for 9,000 sterling pounds (U.S. $17,000). She was sold দ্বারা two Dutch women, Letje Raebel and her daughter, Marina.