They have the time allocated and any ads they don’t sell they replace with their own slop. I’d much sooner they added Moar Trailers. Some of us go to very different films so you can advertise them all to me. Normally it’s just similar films and horror. Because generic horror movies have become like Westerns were in the middle of the last century: the default cheapo movie.
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The theater chain Alamo Drafthouse isn’t perfect but one thing they do that i like is that they roll video clips related to whatever movie you’re going to watch. Like if its Star Wars they play funny SW stuff from youtube, fan made shorts, related clips from shows like Robot Chicken, etc. It’s great and makes arriving early and waiting for the movie to start really enjoyable. Sometimes they might even play clips that give you the history of a character or franchise, recaps, etc which for things like Marvel is really appreciated.
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Well that’s disappointing. I am looking to replace my 10 year old Kindle soon and it won’t be an Amazon device, Kobo was top of my list…
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Right now it seems like it’s in a gray area. It’s not clear what their AI plans are but just based on what I’ve read my confidence in Kobo is pretty low. Hope to see some kind of follow up on this soon.
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It’s news about replacements that have me keeping my original Kindle and first-gen Kindle Fire units limping along. They still work, and I’ve got thousands of books on 'em. 
Unfortunately, I use the Fire as my only connection to FB. Now they keep offering me the app as “a better experience.” 
I never could run their messenger app, so the day they force that app is likely to be my last one checking news from relatives who use FB (and local municipalities, who prefer FB to updating their websites 
).
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See also: Verizon Fios showing ads for Verizon Fios. Hey Fios customers, don’t forget about Fios!
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I think it’d be cool if they filled it with some of those classic cartoon shorts and maybe even throw in some of the old newsreels and public service announcements like they did way back in the day.
Or even just some stuff from the 60s-90s. Funny old commercials or old classic TV show theme songs. At least that’d be kinda entertaining for some nostalgia. Toss in a few trivia questions, then play a clip and then show the answer. Lots of ways to make filler that people actually like.
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Oh for fuck’s sake.
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Effective Monday, June 30, 2025
Costco warehouses will open
at 9 a.m. daily exclusively for
Executive Members.Warehouses will be open for
Gold Star and Business
Members at 10 a.m. Monday
through Friday and Sunday, and
at 9:30 a.m. Saturday.For more information about the
benefits of Executive Membership,
please visit the membership counter.
(edit: misidentified as enshittification; see below)
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Honestly, I don’t see that as enshittification.
Some other stores open one hour earlier for select groups of people; for example, senior citizens, people with disabilities, etc.
They’re not cutting back hours, they’re just adding to them for a subset of members. And since it is a club with members, people can complain and perhaps change the situation.
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You’re right – I was mistaken; I thought they had previously been open at 9 for everyone (hence my posting it here). But the Wayback Machine proves the fallibility of memory.
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Yep, back in the early 80s this is how I remember the hours of Costco. They had an early hour strictly for the business (wholesale resellers) members before the non-wholesale shoppers. I always thought that Executive members could shop with the business members as a perk to paying more for their membership.
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I was watching YouTube while eating lunch. A 12 minute video had 5 interruptions of 30 second unskippable ads inserted seemingly at random throughout the video. They were so disruptive, I had to rewind a by like 10-20 seconds to realign myself mentally once the video resumed. It was immensely shitty.
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I’ve been upgrading my emergency backup systems because prolonged power outages are happening more often in my area. A solar generator and electric cooler were first on the list. Both are very heavy, and I noticed in the reviews many people complained about their units arriving damaged. Some decided to keep the products anyway, due to the weight and inconvenience of shipping them back.
I don’t shop often, but have seen clips online of delivery drivers from various shipping companies flinging fragile items around in ways likely to break whatever was inside the boxes. Still, it was a surprise to see an offer for shipping protection at checkout from a company called Seel. I guess the problems with shipping (and lack of coverage from credit card companies*) have led to this:
*I almost opted out, but a quick check of my card company’s policies made it clear they won’t cover damage from 3rd party transport companies.
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I cannot recommend using Unhook when watching YouTube highly enough. I don’t see ads, comments, or even “click here” boxes blocking the last 20 seconds of content. I also know I could clamp down even more if I wanted.
(Caveat: I run Firefox, so I have no idea if this works as well with other browsers.)
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I do 90% of my YouTube browing on my phone, and the web experience is awful.
I was willing to give Unhook a try on my iPhone, so I downloaded it and it wouldn’t let me tap anything in the app until I gave it access to Screen Time.
I grudgingly accepted and then tried to do something – anything. No matter where I tapped in the app, it would try to force me to sign up for a trial for “Pro” plan (that will charge me $1.99 a week after the trial expires).
There was an option for a “Free” plan, but every time I tapped on it, the app rejected popping up a modal screen that would say I need to sign up for a “Pro” plan.
These are immensely shitty dark patterns and I wasn’t willing to give the app another chance after that.
ETA: The way they do the UI for the pricing is incredibly misleading with its big “$1.99” followed by the tiny text “per week billed bi-annual”, which is approximately $103/year. At that pricing, it’s only marginally more expensive to sign up for a year of YouTube Premium FFS.
ETA 2: I was reading other reviews of the iOS app. Apparently you get charged for 6 months up front, and if you have a Free account and run out of credits, it’ll automatically bill you for 6 months of Pro. It will also give you more credits if you leave a 5 star review. 
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That’s … weird. WTF? Sorry that you ran into that – almost all of my video time is on a desktop, so I haven’t run into that and the extension version hasn’t tried to extort me like that. 
It’s sure a good example of Enshittification ,though.
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I’m still watching YouTube via the Firefox browser on Android (or on Windows). I was having trouble with that on Android (see above) but, for now, it works if I enable google.com in NoScript.
ETA: It doesn’t help anything, though, if I watch a video directly at YouTube (as opposed to embedded here), & underneath are these recommendations festooned with YOU WON’T BELIEVE THE BIG HEADLINES LIKE THE TABLOID RACK AT THE SUPERMARKET
(ETA: The Duck Duck Go trick, linked above, no longer works for me)
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