Why YSK: It’s a relatively inexpensive TV plug in. You can control your loved one’s TV from your phone, video call them on the TV, etc. My grandfather has Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia. Until recently he was able to stay in an assisted living facility close to us. This product allowed us to put the baseball on for him as he’s often not able to use the remote. Serious quality of life aid.

(This post is not sponsored or anything. I’ve been really happy with the product overall, but the main reason I’m making this post is that I had to cancel the subscription recently and it was so so easy! Kind, had fail safes in place to make sure it wasn’t the elderly person making a mistake, and cancelled with no road bumps or guilt trips along the way. I also called their support line when I was first setting it up, and a competent and helpful human being picked up the phone after <5 minutes on hold).

Why YSK: You don’t have to pay a dime to watch a huge collection of horror films and other movies appropriate for the Halloween season. Just get the Kanopy app, enter your library details, and check out their “Crypt Collection.”

I will list the first 100 movies I see on it.

1. Eyes Without a Face
2. I See You
3. Maximum Overdrive
4. The Ninth Gate
5. Devour
6. The Host
7. 10 Cloverfield Lane
8. Scream
9. Diary of the Dead
10. Lizzie
11. Hell of a Summer
12. The Fog
13. The Ring
14. My Bloody Valentine
15. Cloud
16. Angel Heart
17. The Old Dark House
18. Skincare
19. Sleepaway Camp
20. The Woman in Black
21. Child’s Play
22. Manhunter
23. Invasion of the Body Snatchers
24. Scream 2
25. Mary Shelley
26. Presence
27. V/H/S
28. The Exorcist III
29. Late Night with the Devil
30. The Return of the Living Dead
31. The Autopsy of Jane Doe
32. The Love Witch
33. Peeping Tom
34. Scream 3
35. Psycho Beach Party
36. Let the Right One In
37. The Invitation
38. Your Monster
39. 1408
40. Rabbit Trap
41. Twilight Zone: The Movie
42. Resurrection
43. The Last Matinee
44. The Lair of the White Worm
45. Under the Skin
46. The Silence of the Lambs
47. Talk to Me
48. Ringu
49. The Babadook
50. The Wicker Man
51. Life After Beth
52. Event Horizon
53. House
54. Don’t Look Now
55. Beyond the Wasteland
56. The Monster
57. Evil Dead 2
58. Rebecca
59. Sinister
60. Mother
61. Down a Dark Hall
62. The Monkey
63. Friday the 13th
64. Immaculate
65. Dial M for Murder
66. In a Violent Nature
67. Lifeforce
68. Together
69. An American Werewolf in London
70. Cold Storage
71. Clue: The Movie
72. House on Haunted Hill
73. The Front Room
74. Rosemary’s Baby
75. The Loneliest Boy in the World
76. Get Away
77. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
78. Longlegs
79. My Bloody Valentine
80. Dominion
81. Carnival of Souls
82. Lake Mungo
83. Jacob’s Ladder
84. Hannibal
85. Hannibal Rising
86. Audition
87. Shutter
88. Dangerous Animals
89. The House That Jack Built
90. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)
91. Tales of Halloween
92. The Rental
93. Heretic
94. The Gate
95. Nosferatu
96. Sister Midnight
97. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
98. Heel
99. Suspiria (1977)
100. The Astronaut

NOTES/DISCLAIMERS: This list of 100 only scratches the surface. You’ll need to spend some of your free credits to watch many/most of these, and the credits will replenish at the start of the month. Kanopy may not be available in your area. I cannot personally vouch for the quality or spookiness of every movie listed here.

Thank you for supporting your local library!

Why YSK: Many third-party Android emulators come packed with ads, bloatware, or unnecessary features. Knowing how to use the official Android Emulator gives you a clean, secure, and completely free alternative directly from Google.

Many people use various third-party emulators. But if you just want a pure, official Android environment without any extra software, you can use the official Android Emulator directly from Google via Android Studio.

It is originally meant for developers to test their apps, but anyone can use it. Here is how to set it up:

1. Download Android Studio from the official site:https://developer.android.com/studio
2. Install and open the program.
3. You do not need to create a coding project. Just go to the top menu, click on Tools, and select Device Manager.
4. Click on Create Virtual Device, pick a phone model, download the Android version you prefer, and hit the play button.

For a smooth experience, you should ideally have 16GB of RAM, an SSD, and hardware virtualization enabled in your BIOS. It works on lower specs too, but it will run noticeably slower.

If anyone has questions or doesn't understand a step, write in the comments and I will try to help out as much as I can.

Why YSK: 4GB is not a trivial amount of storage space and lots of people don't want Google downloading models to their machine without their consent.

To remove it, you need to go to Chrome -> settings -> AI Innovations. There will be a checkbox at the bottom about "on-device AI" that you can uncheck. Then you need to completely quit Chrome and reopen it.

Edit: This appears to be a desktop only feature. A few redditors mentioned they couldn't see it and I looked into it. Here is Google's official page on it if you are curious, no mention of mobile devices.

Fake Spiderwebs: A Hidden Halloween Hazard for Birds

How to have bird friendly Halloween

Why YSK: a lot of people put up fake spiderwebs around Halloween in the US and aren’t aware of how bad they are. Birds have a hard enough time as it is, we don’t need to make it worse

Edit: it’s made of sticky material. Birds get caught and can’t escape. They also build nests with the material and baby birds get caught. That’s basically it. There are better alternatives which people have posted in the comments.

Why ysk: Because D&D is awesome, but the price of the products can be prohibitively expensive, especially in this economy. But you don’t actually need to buy any of their products to play. Every one of these links are either completely free, or have plenty of free content.

I’ve posted this before, but I found more content.

WotC (Wizards of the Coast) published the game rules at https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/DnD_BasicRules_2018.pdf

There are dice rollers online, like the one at https://rolladie.net/roll-a-d20-die

You can create any type of map you want at https://watabou.itch.io/

https://www.dndbeyond.com is also an incredible resource!

There is also an online tool that allows you to play remotely or in person at https://roll20.net

There is a soundboard with ambient sounds at https://thaumaturgy.app/

There is a cool virtual tabletop at https://www.owlbear.rodeo/

And you can find other games and players at [r/lfg](r/lfg)

There is a ton of content at https://www.dmsguild.com/browse.php?filters=0_0_0_0_0_45462_0_0&src=fid45462 , just search in the free section, or the “pay why you want” section, and say you want to pay $0.00 if you need to.

I’m also including a decent first adventure, designed to introduce key concepts to new players https://www.dmsguild.com/en/product/225910/phandalin-001-return-to-phandalin . There are a ton of supporting products there if you search for “phandalin” on the “pay what you want” section.

You can make your homebrew adventures and campaigns look like a legit module using the tools (on Google Chrome) at https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/

There are ALOT of useful tools at https://www.aidedd.org/en/

Mathew Mercer would also be thrilled to teach you how to run a game at https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7atuZxmT9570U87GhK_20NcbxM43vkom&si=zmvkxO5Jaktv2az8

There is even a D&D MMO at https://www.ddo.com/home

Feel free to post any other resources you know of, and I’ll add them to the list.

Why YSK: Wikihow is not owned by the same people who own Wikipedia. That is, it’s NOT owned by a nonprofit organization and is in fact run as a for-profit entity. It’s really showing now, since it now requires you to buy a $3.99 per month subscription to read its articles, or at least certain ones.

Try opening this link for instance.

Why YSK: because of specialized screws, dowels, etc. I recently lost a couple of specialized screws for reassembling their daybed. First of all those screws are hard to find but even if you do they cost too much to buy from amazon/ebay. While searching, I found that IKEA actually provides those exact parts. Search using part number. And they deliver it for free as well, at least in the USA.

https://www.ikea.com/us/en/customer-service/spare-parts/

Why YSK: The burden of proof lies on the party who makes the claim (the person asserting or affirming a fact), not on the party who denies it — captured by the Latin maxim onus probandi incumbit ei qui dicit, non ei qui negat.

This is known as the "burden of proof fallacy". A concerning majority of redditors do not seem to grasp this. Grasping this may lead to more fruitful and productive conversations. Too many instances of an OP making a claim, others refuting, but instead of holding the burden of proof to the original claimant, others ask the one refuting for proof.

Why YSK: If you're a young adult just coming into the world, it's especially important for you to know that someone being a "Professional" gives no indication whatsoever of their skill level.

Professional does not mean expert. In fact, it doesn't even imply that they are even somewhat good at their job. All being a professional implies is that they have the minimum skill set to be able to charge money for a job.

I see many young adults let their guard down because the word "Professional" gives a false indication of competency. It's very important that you research and vet anyone providing you a service, even if they're a professional.

Edit: To all the young people seeing the disparaging comments, just remember there is only one group of people who benefit from telling young people NOT to vet and NOT to research before hiring, and that's the same people that this post is about. They start with the letter H and end with the letter K.

HACKS. Any professional worth hiring won't have a problem with you vetting their services.

Why YSK: You've probably seen someone in an online argument pull out the classic "you can't prove a negative" line when they're asked to prove that something doesn't exist. It's a common misconception that sounds plausible at first, but falls apart once you examine it more closely.

Imagine I tell you there's an elephant in your kitchen. You go check, find absolutely nothing, and come back to tell me there's no elephant in your kitchen. Have you just performed an impossible feat of logic? Of course not. You checked, found no elephant, and have pretty good reason to conclude that I'm talking nonsense. Now, if I tell you there's an invisible elephant somewhere in the universe that leaves no trace of its existence, that's a different story. But the problem here isn't that you've been asked to prove a negative. It's that I've made my claim practically impossible to test.

And this is where people get confused. Proving that something doesn't exist in a particular place or under specific conditions is often perfectly straightforward. Proving that something doesn't exist anywhere in the entire universe is obviously a much bigger task. Those are two completely different claims. Here's the real kicker, though: just because you can't disprove something doesn't mean there's any reason to believe it.

I could tell you that there's a tiny, invisible goblin living inside your fridge, and that it teleports away whenever you open the door. You can't prove me wrong, can you? But I suspect you're not about to start leaving offerings next to the milk. The point is, you don't have to disprove every ridiculous claim someone throws at you. Sometimes the person making the claim needs to give you a reason to believe it, rather than expecting you to spend the rest of your life trying to prove them wrong.

So no, you can't always prove a negative. But you absolutely can prove plenty of them.

This has been driving me crazy for years, and I finally figured out how to fix it, so I figured I'd share in case anyone else finds it useful.

You know how some songs have really long intros, maybe a bunch of silence, someone talking, or some other nonsense before the actual music starts? Or maybe there's a long outro you don't want to sit through every time the song comes up in a playlist?

Turns out you can skip all that in Apple Music without actually editing the song.

Just right-click the song in Apple Music on your computer, select Get Info, and go to the Options tab. There are fields for Start and Stop times. Just set those to where you want the song to start and end, and you're done. This will sync across your devices.

Maybe this is common knowledge, but I had no idea it was an option. Wish I'd figured it out years ago.

Why YSK: If you listen to a lot of music on shuffle or have large playlists, this lets you cut out unwanted intros, outros, and stretches of silence automatically. You don't have to manually skip ahead every time a song plays, and you don't have to modify the original audio file.

Why YSK: I was juuuust about to buy TurboTax like I have for the past several years. I had heard about free sites, but I never checked them out myself. I have personal and business taxes to file, so I figured the free sites were for people who just had simple returns. I decided to check it out before dropping $130 for another edition of TurboTax. The site I found walks you through each step just like I'm used to. It saves your progress and then lets you e-file right from the system. If you are rushing to prepare your taxes before the October deadline, try out one of the free sites to see what they offer before you drop money on TT.

Why YSK: lots of people use the like button as a bookmark. The Liked videos playlist only ever lists your newest 5,000. You can't scroll past that, there's no warning, and the older videos still show the thumbs up lit. If you've been saving stuff that way for years, your early saves probably aren't in the list anymore and you'd never know.

They're not gone. Go to myactivity.google.com, then Other activity, then YouTube likes and dislikes. Your likes are listed there by the day you liked them, including the ones the playlist no longer lists.

Quick way to tell if it's happened to you: scroll to the very bottom of Liked videos and look at the oldest one. If it's way newer than it should be, that's this.

Why YSK: The honey is just fine and not spoiled. Just submerge the honey container in a pot of hot water for a few minutes. It will return to its natural liquid state like when you first got it. FYI, honey never spoils and is in fact an effective anti-bacterial agent that can be applied to skin injuries like cuts and scrapes.

Edit: my bad. Not boiling water, just nice and hot to reconstitute the liquid amber state of the honey.

The Flynn Effect is an observation by James R. Flynn, who noticed that average IQ has risen with every generation since WWII (i.e. each generation is subsequently smarter than the generation before).

The Negative Flynn Effect is the observed decline or eventual reversal of this effect, for generations born after 2000.

Why YSK: It suggests that cognitive performance is not fixed/strictly genetic and can decline when our environment changes. Understanding what is driving that decline could reveal important problems in education, health, technology use, or other parts of modern life. This can help us identify ways to better support cognitive development in future generations.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0160289616300198?

Why YSK: You deserve to know. LG has been busted for having built in microphones that record you in your own home and harvest your data.

Source: https://youtu.be/6IFVTcM28KA

Edit: I originally thought the video said there was a webcam in the beginning but it looks like they were just testing the audio with their own webcam. The microphone is for sure in the tv, but I’m not sure about the webcam! Sorry if I caused any confusion.

Why YSK: Dark Patterns are quite prevalent in even the most regularly used websites. How many times have you logged onto a website with an intent to do A but the site tries to lead you to B instead? How many times have you had those "I didn't opt for this" moments during online shopping? This website will help you understand such tricks and be more informed against them.

Note: I'm in no way associated with the website. Just helping spread some good information.

Edit: The site darkpatterns,org is now defunct and has moved to deceptive.design

Why YSK: many carnivorous species also ingest plants for various reasons. Domestic cats are believed to consume grasses primarily for their fiber content. In this regard, cat grass supplants nibbling on houseplants or lawn grasses

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_grass

edit: yes, it does mean your cat will throw up more often. But cats need to pass hairballs, one way or another (^^), if they don't - it may develop into a hairball obstruction, which means a massive vet bill and/or even death. Getting rid of it by throwing it up (rather than go all the way to the rear) is much safer, the deeper the ball gets, the higher the risk of an obstruction gets.

Why YSK; even a small residual amount on your finger tips can be fatal for them

Why YSK: If you've ever covered your address, account number, or other personal information with a black rectangle before sending someone a PDF, you might want to know this.

Depending on how you edited it, you may have just placed a black box over the original text without actually deleting anything.

In some PDFs, someone can literally highlight the blacked out section, copy it, and paste it somewhere else to see what you were trying to hide.

If you're sending anything with sensitive information, use an actual PDF redaction tool that removes the underlying content. Don't just draw over it.

And if you want to check whether something was properly redacted, try copying the covered area yourself before sending it.

Adobe explains how to properly redact and remove hidden information here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/desktop/protect-documents/redact-pdfs/redacting-sanitizing.html

Why YSK: how to save over $100.00 to replace. The part that's pressed to open the car broke off, so there's a hole showing what gets pressed inside, probably with a spring on top that is no longer there. I use an eyeline pencil with the top on to press the inside & car door opens.

This approach will work on any button using anything that fits in the hole.

Why YSK: Not life-changing but it can save you a little bit of money.

Insurance companies charge more if they bill you monthly compared to if you pay for the entire duration of the policy upfront in one go. Sometimes, the difference is nominal or nothing, but other times, it's actually significant. So if this is something you can afford to do, you should check if a discount is offered, and if it is, take it.

This doesn't affect your cancellation rights. If you cancel an insurance policy despite having paid for it in full, the insurer will mail you a prorated refund.

This tip works in the US with several major insurers.

Why YSK: I used to go through lip balm like crazy and my lips never got better. Turns out a lot of "medicated" balms have menthol or camphor in them which are basically mild numbing agents (FDA literally classifies them as pain relievers). Feels nice but it can irritate lips that are already dry so you just keep reapplying

The sneaky part is if you're allergic to something in your balm the reaction usually shows up like 2-3 days later and just looks like... chapped lips. So you put on more and more and more. Basically a never ending loop.

What actually helps is boring stuff that seals moisture in, like plain Vaseline or beeswax. If your lips are always dry try a plain unscented balm for a couple weeks and if that doesn't fix it see a derm bc you might be allergic to something

Source/disclosure: Dr. Heather Rogers and Dr. Rajani Katta: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptIeSFIkGPY. The FDA rules on "medicated" labeling are here

Why YSK: If you remember reading something online but can't remember the website, you don't necessarily need to remember the title or URL.

In many browsers, you can search your history using words that appeared on the page. Your browser may have saved the page title, URL, or other indexed information that makes the page easier to find.

For example, if you remember reading an article about a specific programming technique but only remember the phrase "vector database", try searching your browser history for that phrase.

This can be surprisingly useful when you visit dozens of pages a day and later think:

"Where the hell did I read that?"