Looks like one of those recorded message things you find inside greeting cards - the glob of stuff below the black epoxy blob (the ic), looks like a badly corroded button.
Can try cleaning the button up a bit, or removing it entirely, and bridge the connections beneath it.
I would use
$
too for the example you’ve posted - it is just assuming a different user.As long as it is not root, I wouldn’t put it with
#
.