MoviePass is back thanks to MoviePass co-founder Stacy Spikes, who was fired from the company in 2018 for questioning the sustainability of its business model. "Under the company's new points-based system, you can pay $10 per month to watch one to three movies at any of the 4,000 participating theaters throughout the US," reports The Verge. From the report: In addition to the $10 / month Basic plan, MoviePass offers three more expensive subscription options: a $20 / month Standard plan for three to seven movies per month, a $30 / month Premium plan for five to 11 movies per month, and a $40 / month Pro for up to 30 movies per month. There's a separate, more expensive subscription for customers in Southern California and the New York metro area. The reason why each tier includes a range of movies you can watch has to do with the way MoviePass' new credits system works. Every tier offers a different number of credits that you can redeem on movies each month, with Basic having the least number of credits and the Pro plan having the most.

According to MoviePass, a film's credit value can fluctuate depending on a number of factors, including the time of day and day of the week you want to watch it. Based on tweets from customers who tested the service, credit costs have changed without warning and can vary significantly across showings. If you don't use up all your credits, MoviePass says it will roll them over to the next month, allowing you to have a maximum of two months' worth of unused credits in your account to use at a later date. Once you sign up for the service, you'll receive a MoviePass card within 10 to 15 business days that you'll need to use at supported theaters. The sustainability of MoviePass started to crumble in 2017 when it began offering customers unlimited movie-watching for just $9.95 per month. The seemingly too-good-to-be-true pricing ultimately resulted in the company's bankruptcy two years later.

Additionally, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit against MoviePass, alleging that the company had misled investors about the viability of its business model.

Netflix's controversial password sharing crackdown just hit the US. From a report: In addition to the US, Netflix confirmed it will also be rolling out the crackdown across all regions around the world such as the UK, France, Germany, Mexico, Brazil, Singapore, Australia, among others. "Netflix account is for use by one household," the company wrote in the post. "Everyone living in that household can use Netflix wherever they are -- at home, on the go, on holiday -- and take advantage of new features like Transfer Profile and Manage Access and Devices." Netflix broadened its crackdown in early February to include countries like Canada, New Zealand, Portugal, and Spain, in addition to the test countries of Chile, Costa Rica, and Peru. It previously said "a broad rollout" of the policy would hit this quarter.

Bandcamp is music streaming platform helping fans support independent musicians. And Bandcamp United describes itself as "a union of workers at Bandcamp — we are project managers, we are engineers, we are designers, we are vinyl campaign managers, we are support staff, we are editors and writers..."

Friday Bandcamp United issued this statement: Today, a majority of eligible Bandcamp workers voted 31-7 in favor of forming Bandcamp United, a union represented by the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU). The vote results now await certification by the National Labor Relations Board, with a collective bargaining process to follow.

Below is a joint statement from Bandcamp co-founder Ethan Diamond and Bandcamp United:

â "Bandcamp United and Bandcamp management are committed to working together to continue to advance fair economic conditions for our workers and the artists who rely on us. We look forward to negotiating with an open mind and working in good faith to promote the best interests of all of our staff and the artist and label community we serve."

Thelasko writes: A Star Wars-themed hotel at Walt Disney World is being shut down about a year after opening, the company announced. The hotel, which is marketed as a two-night immersive experience, will take its last bookings Sep. 28 to 30. New bookings are being paused until May 26 to first accommodate those who made reservations after September. [...] The two-night packages start at about $4,800 for two people, and go up to $5,299 for two adults and one child and $5,999 for three adults and one child. Prices include lodging, meals and admission to Hollywood Studios. Upon arriving, guests enter a launch pod to board the Halcyon starcruiser, stay in a room with a space view and are able to interact with the franchise's characters throughout the ship.

Netflix has held talks with UK telecoms groups that carry the streaming group's service ahead of a crackdown on account sharing expected later this month. From a report: The US group, which has said the free use of its platform has hit its ability to invest in new TV and films, plans to start warning customers over account-sharing violations in the coming weeks, according to people familiar with the situation. Telecoms groups that use Netflix as part of bundled TV content have held meetings in the past week over the planned warnings, people familiar with the talks said. Companies such as Sky, BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk offer Netflix as part of bundled deals on broadband and TV content. But those close to the talks said there was a risk of complaints from some subscribers, many of whom have grown accustomed to sharing their account details with family and friends, activity to which the company had previously turned a blind eye. One person described it as being a "good partner" to groups that offer the service as part of their subscriptions. Telecoms companies' call centres are likely to field questions and complaints once the plans are enacted, according to a person familiar with the issue, which has meant that they have needed close co-operation with Netflix.

An anonymous reader shares a report: This week, we looked at a new hardware startup called Telly that's giving away half a million of its new smart televisions for free. The catch is that the 55-inch smart television is fitted with a second display that sits underneath and displays ads while you watch your favorite shows. The trade-off for a free television is agreeing to let this brand-new startup collect vast amounts of data about you because the money ads make from you cover the costs of the television itself. According to its privacy policy, the startup collects data about what you view, where you're located, what you watch, as well as what could be inferred about you from that information.

But annotations left in its privacy policy that were published in error raise concerns about its data practices. We've pasted below the portion of Telly's privacy policy verbatim, typos included, as it was published at the time -- and have highlighted the questionable passage in bold for emphasis: "As noted in the Terms of Use, we do not knowingly collect or solicitPersonal Data about children under 13 years of age; ifyou are a child under the age of 13, please do not attempt to register for orotherwise use the Services or send us any Personal Data. Use of the Servicesmay capture the physical presence of a child under the age of 13, but noPersonal Data about the child is collected. If we learn we have collectedPersonal Data from a child under 13 years of age, we will delete thatinformation as quickly as possible. (I don't know that this is accurate. Do wehave to say we will delete the information or is there another way aroundthis)? If you believe that a child under 13 years of age may have providedPersonal Data to us, please contact us at..." A short time after contacting Telly for comment, the company removed the section from its privacy policy.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to make it illegal for carmakers to eliminate AM radio from their cars, arguing public safety is at risk. From the report: AM radio is one key way that government officials communicate with the public during natural disasters and other emergencies. Officials worry that if drivers don't have access, they might miss important safety alerts. Some manufacturers are eliminating AM radio from their electric vehicles (EVs) because of interference from the electric motors that creates annoying buzzing noises and faded signals.

They argue that car owners can still access AM radio content through digital streaming packages or smartphone apps (though such services sometimes require a subscription). While AM might seem like a relic of the past, nearly 50 million people still listen to it, according to Nielsen figures provided by the National Association of Broadcasters. The proposed legislation, to be introduced today by Senators Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and others, would require all new vehicles to include AM radio at no additional charge. In the case of EV models that have already eliminated AM radio (from BMW, Ford, Mazda, Polestar, Rivian, Tesla, Volkswagen and Volvo), carmakers would be required to disclose the lack of AM access to consumers. The law would also direct the Government Accountability Office to study whether alternative communication systems are as effective in reaching the public during emergencies. Further reading: Saving AM Radio - the Case For and Against.

South Korea's LG Display will start supplying high-end TV panels to Samsung Electronic from as early as this quarter, three sources told Reuters, in a deal that would help the loss-making flat-screen maker turn profitable. From the report:LG Display aims to supply 2 million units next year and boost shipments to 3 million and 5 million units in subsequent years, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said. Initial supplies to Samsung would likely be 77-inch and 83-inch white OLED (WOLED) TV panels. For Samsung, the deal highlights how it is looking to expand in high-end organic light emitting diode (OLED) TVs as competition heats up in the lower end with Chinese vendors. OLED panels cost nearly five times more than liquid-crystal display (LCD) panels. With this deal, Samsung could overtake Sony as the second largest supplier of OLED TVs globally.

Ilya Pozin made a bunch of money when Viacom bought Pluto TV, the free video-streaming company he co-founded, for $340 million four years ago. Since exiting Pluto about a year after that deal closed, Pozin has been working on another startup venture -- one he thinks will be a much bigger deal. From a report: On Monday, Pozin's brainchild, Telly, comes out of stealth after two years in development. Telly wants to ship out thousands (and eventually millions) of free 4K HDTVs, which would cost more than $1,000 at retail, according Pozin. The 55-inch main screen is a regular TV panel, with three HDMI inputs and an over-the-air tuner, plus an integrated soundbar. The Telly TVs don't actually run any streaming apps that let you access services like Netflix, Prime Video or Disney+; instead, they're bundled with a free Chromecast with Google TV adapter.

What's new and different: The unit has a 9-inch-high second screen, affixed to the bottom of the set, which is real estate Telly will use for displaying news, sports scores, weather or stocks, or even letting users play video games. And, critically, Telly's second screen features a dedicated space on the right-hand side that will display advertising -- ads you can't skip past and ads that stay on the screen the whole time you're watching TV... and even when you're not.

This weekend the Washington Post updated the current status of AM radio: Automakers, such as BMW, Volkswagen, Mazda and Tesla, are removing AM radios from new electric vehicles because electric engines can interfere with the sound of AM stations. And Ford, one of the nation's top-three auto sellers, is taking a bigger step, eliminating AM from all of its vehicles, electric or gas-operated...

Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, Kia and Jaguar Land Rover — said they have no plans to eliminate AM.
The case for removing AM radio: [A]lthough 82 million Americans still listen to AM stations each month, according to the National Association of Broadcasters, the AM audience has been aging for decades. Ford says its data, pulled from internet-connected vehicles, shows that less than 5 percent of in-car listening is to AM stations. Ford spokesman Alan Hall said that because most AM stations also offer their programming online or on FM sister stations, the automaker will continue to "offer these alternatives for customers to hear their favorite AM radio music and news as we remove [AM] from most new and updated models." The 2024 Mustang is Ford's first internal combustion model to be marketed without AM...

As Ford did, BMW eliminated AM from electric models in part because "technological innovation has afforded consumers many additional options to receive the same or similar information," Adam McNeill, the company's U.S. vice president of engineering, said in a letter to Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.)... For the automakers, eliminating AM is a simple matter of numbers and progress. The AM audience keeps getting smaller and older, and the growth of alternative forms of in-car audio has been explosive.
But the Post adds this this happening "despite protests from station owners, listeners, first-responders and politicians from both major parties." and they point out that half of all AM-radio listening takes place in cars: Many AM stations don't offer alternative ways to listen to their shows. Even those that do say their audience, much of which is older, tends not to be adept at the technologies that let drivers stream anything they choose from their smartphones into their car's audio system. And despite the growing popularity of podcasts and streaming audio, a large majority of in-car listening remains old-fashioned broadcast radio, according to industry studies.

[S]ome of the country's most lucrative radio stations are still on AM, mostly all-news or news and talk stations in big cities such as New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Los Angeles.ome of the country's most lucrative radio stations are still on AM, mostly all-news or news and talk stations in big cities such as New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Los Angeles.
The Post also points out that AM and FM radio combined account for 60 percent of all in-car listening, according to a new study by Edison Research. "SiriusXM satellite radio makes up 16 percent of in-car audio use, followed by drivers' own music from their phones at 7 percent and podcasts and YouTube music videos at 4 percent each."

Long-time Slashdot reader theodp writes: AWS offered A Look Inside the Making of an NFL Football Schedule in conjunction with Thursday's release of the 2023 NFL Schedule Powered by AWS. AWS notes that producing the schedule required the use of 4,000+ AWS EC2 Spot Instances. An AWS promotional video claims they "saved the NFL an estimated $2 million each season" by leveraging AWS Spot Instances for a discount of up to 90% off compared to AWS On-Demand pricing..

"In just three months," AWS explains, "National Football League (NFL) schedule makers methodically build an exciting 18 week 272-game schedule spanning 576 possible game windows." Up until 10 years ago, AWS notes in an accompanying infographic, the NFL used a white-boarding process to manually craft its schedule.

Not to diminish the NFL's and AWS's 2023 scheduling achievement, but the 2013 documentary The Schedule Makers told the remarkable tale of the husband-and-wife duo of Henry and Holly Stephenson, who for almost a quarter of a century in the pre-Cloud era managed the scheduling for 30 Major League Baseball (MLB) teams who each played 162 regular season games a year. According to the May 1985 Atari Compendium (pg. 38), the Stephensons were using a self-written program running on a 64K IMS-8000 to help schedule games for the MLB (2,106 games over a 6-month season), NBA, and NASL/MISL (defunct soccer leagues). So perhaps the NFL's claim that "There's no way the NFL could deliver the quality of schedule that we put out every year for our fans and television partners without the contributions of our friends at AWS" should be taken with a grain of salt.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Google [on Wednesday] released MusicLM, a new experimental AI tool that can turn text descriptions into music. Available in the AI Test Kitchen app on the web, Android or iOS, MusicLM lets users type in a prompt like "soulful jazz for a dinner party" or "create an industrial techno sound that is hypnotic" and have the tool create several versions of the song. Users can specify instruments like "electronic" or "classical," as well as the "vibe, mood, or emotion" they're aiming for, as they refine their MusicLM-generated creations.

When Google previewed MusicLM in an academic paper in January, it said that it had "no immediate plans" to release it. The coauthors of the paper noted the many ethical challenges posed by a system like MusicLM, including a tendency to incorporate copyrighted material from training data into the generated songs. But in the intervening months, Google says it's been working with musicians and hosting workshops to "see how [the] technology can empower the creative process." One of the outcomes? The version of MusicLM in AI Test Kitchen won't generate music with specific artists or vocals. Make of that what you will. It seems unlikely, in any case, that the broader challenges around generative music will be easily remedied. You can sign up to try MusicLM here.

TV providers in the U.S. collectively lost 2.3 million customers in the first quarter of 2023. "With the Q1 decline, total pay-TV penetration of occupied U.S. households (including for internet services like YouTube TV and Hulu) dropped to 58.5% -- its lowest point since 1992," reports Variety, citing a report from MoffettNathason. "As of the end of Q1, U.S. pay-TV services had 75.5 million customers, down nearly 7% on an annual basis." From the report: Cable TV operators' rate of decline in Q1 reached -9.9% year over year, while satellite providers DirecTV and Dish Network fell -13.4%. In addition, so-called "virtual MVPDs" (multichannel video programming distributors) lost 264,000 customers in Q1, among the worst quarters to date for the segment. "The picture is not one that suggests that a plateau in the rate of decline is coming any time soon," Moffett wrote.

Comcast, the largest pay-TV provider in the country, dropped 614,000 video customers in Q1 -- the most of any single company -- to stand at 15.53 million at the end of the period. Asked about dwindling video business on the company's earnings call, David Watson, president and CEO of Comcast Cable, acknowledged the reality of cord-cutting and said the operator's approach is "to not subsidize unprofitable video relationships." He added, "We'll fight hard, whether it's acquisition, base management or retention. So it's important to us, but we have figured out a way to manage it financially."

Google's YouTube TV was the only provider tracked by MoffettNathanson that picked up subs in Q1, adding an estimated 300,000 subscribers in the period (to reach about 6.3 million) and netting 1.4 million subscribers over the past year. Hulu, meanwhile, has barely grown over the past three years (and loss about 100,000 live TV subs in Q1), Moffett noted, while FuboTV lost 160,000 subscribers in North America in the first quarter to mark its worst quarterly loss on record. MoffettNathason argues that the "pay TV floor" is between 50 million and 60 million U.S. homes. "As things stand, we expect cord-cutting to grow even worse and the long-theorized 'floor' to be breached."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Today, Fairphone, a company known for making smartphones that are meant to last, revealed its take on a user repair-friendly set of wireless, over-the-ear headphones. Like its smartphones, Fairphone's Fairbuds XL have a modular design with Fairphone promising easy spare parts access. However, Fairphone's currently unsure how long it will have parts for the cans in stock. And Fairphone is pulling back from its typical five-year warranty for phones, opting for two years, due to uncertainty around real-world longevity. Modular parts for the Fairbuds XL, which in true Fairphone fashion won't be sold in the US, include a headband cover that pops off to reveal the actual band, a cable connecting the speakers, and left and right speaker modules that allow users to replace a failed driver or wonky buttons.

As of this writing, the 11 modular parts aren't listed for sale, but The Verge reported a replacement battery will cost 19.95 euro, while ear cushions will cost 14.95 euro, and the three headband parts will be 19.95 euro for each. Most of the headset's electronics components, like the Bluetooth 5.1 module, reside in the left and right speaker parts, but Fairphone may start selling spare printed circuit boards, buttons, and microphones if demand warrants, The Verge said. Other headsets have offered replacement ear cushions and head straps before. However, the Fairbuds XL go further by enabling the entire frame of the headband to be swapped easily and encouraging battery replacements. There are wireless headsets with batteries you could manage to replace yourself, but doing so with the Fairbuds XL won't void the warranty.

Further, Fairbuds XL batteries are supposed to be easy to get through Fairphone, which will also sell Fairbuds XL modules through the Fairbuds App available on Play Store and App Store. A big sticking point for user repairability advocates is making spare parts accessible and affordable. Fairphone will also work with customers to provide support or contact with a repair partner if they don't want to perform repairs themselves and accept customers' unwanted components for reuse or recycling, according to The Verge.

Disney CEO Bob Iger said the company will add Hulu content to its Disney+ streaming app, adding that it will also raise the price of its ad-free streaming service later this year. CNBC reports: CEO Bob Iger said the company would soon begin offering a "one app experience" in the U.S. that incorporates Hulu content into its flagship streaming service, Disney+. Standalone options for all of Disney's platforms, including ESPN+, will remain. "This is a logical progression of our DTC offerings that will provide greater opportunities for advertisers, while giving bundle subscribers access to more robust and streamlined content resulting in greater audience engagement and ultimately leading to a more unified streaming experience," Iger said during Wednesday's earnings call.

Iger attributed the move toward a one-app location for both Disney+ and Hulu content to the "advertising potential for the combined platform." While Hulu has long offered an ad-supported option for subscribers, Disney+ launched the cheaper tier last year. Disney will begin to roll out the one-app offering by the end of the calendar year, and Iger said the company would share further details at a later time. In the company's fiscal second quarter earnings, the company reported $21.82 billion in revenue, up 13% from the same period last year and beating estimates. It did, however, shed 4 million Disney+ subscribers.

Zero interaction with employees during a transaction no longer guarantees freedom from the moral quandary of how much to tip. From a report: Prompts to leave 20% at self-checkout machines at airports, stadiums, cookie shops and cafes across the country are rankling consumers already inundated by the proliferation of tip screens. Business owners say the automated cues can significantly increase gratuities and boost staff pay. But the unmanned prompts are leading more customers to question what, exactly, the tips are for. "They're cutting labor costs by doing self-checkout. So what's the point of asking for a tip? And where is it going?" says Ishita Jamar, a senior at American University in Washington, D.C., who has noticed more self-serve tip cues at restaurants she frequents.

Tipping researchers and labor advocates say so-called tip creep is a way for employers to put the onus for employee pay onto consumers, rather than raising wages themselves. Companies say tips are an optional thanks for a job well done. Businesses "are taking advantage of an opportunity," says William Michael Lynn, who studies consumer behavior and tip culture as a professor at Cornell University's Nolan School of Hotel Administration. "Who wouldn't want to get extra money at very little cost if you could?" Square, whose technology powers many iPad point-of-sale machines, says tipped transactions were up 17% year-over-year at full-service restaurants and 16% at quick-service restaurants in the fourth quarter of 2022.

Amazon has launched a new unit, Amazon MGM Studios Distribution, that will allow the company to license Amazon Originals and other titles to third-party media companies, including streaming services and cable TV. TechCrunch reports: For the first time, titles such as âoeThe Marvelous Mrs. Maisel," "Borat Subsequent Moviefilm," "Coming 2 America," "Goliath," "Hunters," "The Tender Bar," "The Tomorrow War," "The Voyeurs" and "Without Remorse," among others, will be sold to other media outlets following their initial run on Prime Video. While the company has distributed shows before, this new venture will be on a much larger scale. Plus, Amazon Originals are mainly exclusive to Prime Video, making it an enticing sale for companies looking to have popular titles on their platforms.

The launch of Amazon MGM Studios Distribution will also allow the company to handle sales of MGM-owned franchises James Bond, Rocky and Creed, as well as "The Handmaid's Tale," "Fargo" and "Vikings." Last year, Amazon acquired MGM for $8.5 billion, giving the company access to more than 4,000 films and 17,000 TV series. [...] According to Chris Ottinger, who will lead Amazon MGM Studios Distribution, the unit will offer flexible bundles, reported Deadline, so sellers can create bundled content packages that work for them. This strategy will likely allow the company to stand out from competitors.

An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from a Motherboard article: Now, frustrated with a lack of transparency and trust around official accounts of UFO phenomena, a team of developers has decided to take matters into their own hands with an open source citizen science project called Sky360, which aims to blanket the earth in affordable monitoring stations to watch the skies 24/7, and even plans to use AI and machine learning to spot anomalous behavior. Unlike earlier 20th century efforts such as inventors proposing "geomagnetic detectors" to discover nearby UFOs, or more recent software like the short-lived UFO ID project, Sky360 hopes that it can establish a network of autonomously operating surveillance units to gather real-time data of our skies. Citizen-led UFO research is not new. Organizations like MUFON, founded in 1969, have long investigated sightings, while amateur groups like the American Flying Saucer Investigating Committee of Columbus even ran statistical analysis on sightings in the 1960s (finding that most of them happened on Wednesdays). However, Sky360 believes that the level of interest and the technology have now both reached an inflection point, where citizen researchers can actually generate large-scale actionable data for analysis all on their own.

The Sky360 stations consist of an AllSkyCam with a wide angle fish-eye lens and a pan-tilt-focus camera, with the fish-eye camera registering all movement. Underlying software performs an initial rough analysis of these events, and decides whether to activate other sensors -- and if so, the pan-tilt-focus camera zooms in on the object, tracks it, and further analyzes it. According to developer Nikola Galiot, the software is currently based on a computer vision "background subtraction" algorithm that detects any motion in the frame compared to previous frames captured; anything that moves is then tracked as long as possible and then automatically classified. The idea is that the more data these monitoring stations acquire, the better the classification will be. There are a combination of AI models under the hood, and the system is built using the open-source TensorFlow machine learning platform so it can be deployed on almost any computer. Next, the all-volunteer team wants to create a single algorithm capable of detection, tracking and classification all in one.

All the hardware components, from the cameras to passive radar and temperature gauges, can be bought cheaply and off-the-shelf worldwide -- with the ultimate goal of finding the most effective combinations for the lowest price. Schematics, blueprints, and suggested equipment are all available on the Sky360 site and interested parties are encouraged to join the project's Discord server. There are currently 20 stations set up across the world, from the USA to Canada to more remote regions like the Azores in the middle of the Atlantic [...] Once enough of the Sky360 stations have been deployed, the next step is to work towards real-time monitoring, drawing all the data together, and analyzing it. By striving to create a huge, open, transparent network, anyone would be free to examine the data themselves.

In June of this year, Sky360, which has a team of 30 volunteer developers working on the software, hopes to release its first developer-oriented open source build. At its heart is a component called 'SimpleTracker', which receives images frame by frame from the cameras, auto-adjusting parameters to get the best picture possible. The component determines whether something in the frame is moving, and if so, another analysis is performed, where a machine learning algorithm trained on the trajectories of normal flying objects like planes, birds, or insects, attempts to classify the object based on its movement. If it seems anomalous, it's flagged for further investigation.

The Today show's food reporter delivers a strange report on a viral AI-generated ad "for an imaginary pizza place called 'Pepperoni Hug Spot'."

Everything looks slightly ... off. Generated by AI, the audience is reminded constantly through the uncanny valley that the people aren't real — and neither is the pizza. "Cheese, pepperoni, vegetable, and more secret things," says the voiceover, which is also artificially generated... "Knock, knock, who's there? Pizza magic," the AI narrator says after a delivery driver (whose steering column is on the left side of his car) is shown delivering a pizza.

"Eat Pepperoni Hug Spot pizza. Your tummy say 'Thank you.' Your mouth say, 'Mmm,'" the ad continues while showing a trio of women eating pizza in the oddest possible fashion, complete with bizarre cheese pulls and facial contortions out of a food-based nightmare. "Pepperoni Hug Spot: Like family, but with more cheese..."

Using AI technologies Runway Gen2, Chat GPT4, Eleven Labs, Midjourney and Soundraw AI, the creator was able to produce the background music, voiceover, graphics, video and even generate the script for the ad. "I used Adobe After Effects to combine all the elements, adding title cards, transitions, and graphics," he adds... Seeing it spread, he whipped up a website that fit the uncanny vibe of the commercial and even created merch including hats and T-shirts.

"I figured I should capitalize on my 15 minutes of internet fame, right?" he jokes.
Twitter CEO Elon Musk "simply responded with an exploding head emoji."

And Pizza Hut's official Twitter account posted their reaction: "My heebies have been jeebied."

UPDATE: Saturday Pizza Hut Canada "transformed" one of its restaurants into the restaurant from the commercial, emblazoning the logo for Pepperoni Hug Spot onto its boxes, employee t-shirts, and the sign outside. There's two videos on the official Instagram feed for Pizza Hut Canada (which for the occasion changed its tagline to "Like family, but with more cheese.")

One video closes by promising the pizza does, indeed, contain "secret things."

All across North America today, over 2,000 comic book stores are celebrating Free Comic Book Day. As it enters its third decade — the event started in 2001, according to Wikipedia — there'll be over two dozen free comic books to choose from this, and enthusiastic stores trying to dial up the fun even more.

16 stores are also giving away Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania in special "ant-sized" boxes — the size of penny — with tiny versions of the cover art from the full-sized Blu-Ray disc boxes (along with a code for a digital version of the movie). The Bleeding Cool site has a running list of stores doing additional special "cool stuff," including cookie giveaways, discounts on paperbacks and comic books, and personal appearances by comic book writers and artists.

Geek-friendly free comic books this year:

• Dark Horse Comics' Star Wars/ Avatar: The Last Airbender
• D.C. Comics is offering Dawn of DC — Knight Terrors
• Marvel is offering several multi-character books, including Spider-Man/Venom, the Avengers/X-Men, and a sampler of the upcoming graphic novel biography of Stan Lee
• IDW's free comics include the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
• There's also the official prequel to the new Street Fighter 6 video game
• Also available: Runescape: Untold Tales/God Wars
• Fantagraphics even has a preview of its upcoming Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers book.
• Archie Horror Presents: The Cursed Library

Bleeding Cool also has previews the artwork from Star Trek: Prelude to Day of Blood, a teaser for a coming "comic book crossover event between IDW's main Star Trek comic and the Star Trek: Defiant series" (that's also accompanied by a Lower Decks comic book story).

Just remember, in 2017 NPR had this advice for visiting comics fans. "While you're there, buy something... The comics shops still have to pay for the 'free' FCBD books they stock, and they're counting on the increased foot traffic to lift sales."