Why aren't AA batteries square?

I was thinking about electric ones. Having to hold two buttons and pull a starter cord on a petrol driven one would surely require three hands?

and of course the sides are evenly loaded and will not bulge like a square tank will if not braced.

Indeed. I would never donate to anything in another country, apart from animals.

I had Beta machines, from when my father wanted the HiFi feature.

IIRC, I saw the feature demonstrated in a commercial (many times, as normal for commercials).

There was one where they had a trained dog. The owner wound say "play" and the dog would go over and press the play button. Then the owner would say "Betaskipscan". The dog would whine and get the remote.

I was talking about electric ones too.

Also, I was reminded of the (2007 ?) American fuel cans with the complicated spouts where it takes 3 hands to pour properly.

I meant for the animal's sake.

then I don't understand what "started" has to do with anything. It's just as dangerous when running.

Dunno, they've always been quite simple here. A 1 gallon plastic box with a screw on tube.

As I understand it, Betaskipscan would show the picture at full fast forward speed? How did the heads do this?

I'm not sure, but possibly it reads just a line or 2 of each frame, then somehow combines them into one image.

I guess it would have to tilt the head to the new angle for reading. VHS seemed to be pretty s*it at this to begin with. Later video recorders didn't have such a terrible line of fuzz when fast forwarding.