Don’t know if it’s considered canon, but I can live with it.
I say Short Treks is just as canon as Discovery. Whether or not you consider Discovery "canon" is up to each individual, but if you consider that show canon, you should consider Short Treks canon as well.
everything always goes back to normal hence there is no point to even doing the episode
That could be argued for just about every early Star Trek story. Most episodes have their story entirely wrapped up by the end of the episode, and none of the cataclysmic events have any effect on future episodes in any way. Time travel is absolutely not a necessity for that.
A character simply driving a Mercedes car is one thing. But podcast ads are more akin to a movie character entirely interrupting the flow of the film to stop and talk for two minutes straight about how great Mercedes is and to recite a series of specifications about that model car and gush at what a low price it is.
I definitely remember seeing this recently as well. But I just scrolled though the last several pages of posts in the usual Star Trek spaces, and I could not find it. I even checked Reddit.
