Backup accounts (in case of server problems): @maltasoron@lemmy.world, @maltasoron@feddit.nl

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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: April 24th, 2023

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  • In the Netherlands there are plenty of online retailers like Coolblue who are doing well by competing on quality and customer service, despite prices being a bit higher (ironically). Next working day delivery is standard, so that isn’t an issue.

    Bol.com is also really successful and much like Amazon, including its problems.

    I assume this is because of a first mover advantage; for a long time, Amazon was only available in the UK, Germany and France*, so that created a major disadvantage. I’m guessing this might apply to a lot of smaller European countries.

    *maybe other countries too, but at any rate not in the Benelux.


  • Considering busywork, many online texts are unnecessarily long in order to fit as many ads in between as possible. I’ve encountered texts (even about academic subjects) that are practically unreadable if you don’t skim them, because they’re not meant to be read closely.

    Everyone knows what it’s like to look up information on the internet nowadays: most of your time is spent on scrolling or clicking past ads and scanning webpages until you’ve found a source that’s actually useful.

    I think a lot of people have been trained to skim online texts because they’re designed explicitly to waste your time.


  • There’s a difference between simplifying a message and writing at a lower reading comprehension level. I think a lot of accidental incomprehension might just be caused by the reader not being very good at reading English.

    In my country (and I think the whole EU), government agencies have to write at a B1 level to make sure official publications and letters are accessible to all citizens. I think that’s a good rule of thumb for online conversations as well. (However, writing pleasant prose at B1 level is a whole different beast. Generally, they’re not very good at it.)