I like “cleanup aisle 5!”

When the “Amazon smile” was added in 2000, it was a very different company. I used to work there a few years after that and did not leave on good terms a decade later.

In those early days, there was a bunch of innovation that was good for customers, for example showing critical reviews online (vendors were horrified as previously only curated good or editorial reviews were shown), or listing used items alongside the new ones, Amazon music let you upload your own mp3s, AWS majority leveled the playing field for startups, …

But even back then everybody knew that the warehouse jobs had very bad conditions (though that was certainly not unique to Amazon).

By 2015 I had certainly had enough. Vendors were squeezed for every cent, Amazon just copied successful products and produced them themselves in China, the management culture became more and more toxic (Managers had to find bad performers in their team, no matter if there were any), new people earned so much more than people who had some the same job for years, promotions decisions were majority influence by office politics, senior managers ran pretty much unchecked, the interview process was so hard, everybody who was involved from the Amazon side doubted they could make it through themselves, … Currently, established authors have 0 recourse of somebody sells AI-generated books under their name.

I could go on :p

Enshittification doesn’t just apply to online things.

It’s “Kampf” … I have tried to read a few pages… It’s unreadable drivel.

Fun fact: The book wasn’t available in Germany for decades, because upon Hitler’s suicide the copyright fell to the State of Bavaria. That recently expired and now you can find some heavily annotated versions.

it’s simply lazy

So, what does it have to do with poor education?

Just pointing out that not everybody who can’t spell shit is poorly educated.

Dyslexia, ADHD, having a different native language, ducking autocorrect, … Lots of reasons.

Speeding screams impatient 🤷

I’m in my late 40s, suffering from depression since I had extreme burnout from my big tech job.

One thing to watch out for: I took an SSRI for a long time and only when I stopped taking it (SLOW TAPER, please) did I notice how much it had suppressed all my emotions. I tried a different one and it is much better. Ymmv.

Not claiming I have solved any of those issues, but the things that always do make a positive impact for me are Community, Action, and Compassion. And don’t forget yourself with the compassion. Good luck!

I recently read a letter by Dietrich Bonnhoefer, who was a German Lutheran pastor and anti-Nazi dissident, who was imprisoned in 1943, hanged by Hitler’s personal directive in April 1945.

His letter is titled “On Stupidity” and it explains A LOT.

Yeah, that feels like crossing a line for me. I don’t believe in guilt by association.

How do you know somebody didn’t just subscribe to monitor them?