Thijs Niks @thijsniks Twitter profile

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Thijs Niks

7 years

What will road transport look like in the future? A speculative thread of personal thoughts. Hint: The opposite of this picture.

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Last Seen Profiles

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Amsterdam airport police running after hundreds of climate activists blocking private jets while on bicycles is objectively funny

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

Dutch emergency services have a gear knolling meme going

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

The perfect pizza menu doesn’t exi…

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

The Benny Hill theme fits perfectly

Graham

@onalifeglug

2 years

@thijsniks @neluunaa

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

All I want from Google Maps is a simple button to hide my saved places so I can actually see the map

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

To be clear: I also support throwing soup at art. Blocking private jets with your bicycle is funnier though!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 months

For the love of god, Google, just give me a toggle to disable the saved locations layer

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

+1 for Patagonia

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Dit is het Nederlandse coronabeleid in een notendop: Niet €10 miljoen uitgeven aan de oplossing (vaccinfabriek) Wel €700 miljoen uitgeven aan een zoethoudertje (fieldlabs)

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

I’m trying to figure out how to send $6000 from my Chase bank account to my wife’s Chase account for our income tax payment and the answer is to either: - Write a free paper check - Send $2000 for 3 days through Zelle - Pay $25 for a wire transfer America 🥴

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

I still wish iPhones would automatically convert photos from the HEIC to JPG format whenever you share them

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 month

Blows my mind that the bus doesn’t keep moving in America

Choresh Wald

@Choresh2

1 month

When fare enforcement officers board the @NYCTBus to check for proof of payments the bus just stops there, idling, for 5 minutes, without moving. Imagine blocking the midtown tunnel just to check vehicles with defaced, illegal fake license plates (keep imagining).

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

Halting the construction of the Ontario Line subway to save 5 trees keeps 28,000 cars per day on the road Compensating a year of car emissions takes ~20 trees. If the delay is a week, city councillor Josh will need to plant 10,730 trees to make it right.

Metrolinx begins to clear trees at Osgoode Hall, agrees to 'pause work' ahead of hearing on their...

A spokesperson for the Law Society of Ontario (LSO) says Metrolinx began cutting down historic trees at Osgoode Hall in Toronto on Saturday before the Ontario Superior Court could hear an injunction...

toronto.ctvnews.ca

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

All ages No silly helmets Gender balance Dress for the destination

Oto Ozols

@otucis

2 years

Build it and they will come.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

It took a decade, but Apple just completely removed the need for understanding files and folders with the iPhone. This kind of fundamental change is what great design looks like!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

6 years

There is no way of using a laptop or phone in a meeting and still be present

andrew chen

@andrewchen

6 years

What is your least popular but deeply held opinion on personal productivity?

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

I guess Venice shows how we will respond to rising sea levels

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

27% of kids in Amsterdam cycle to their elementary school by themselves, 12% walk by themselves, and 11% is a cargo bike passenger

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

The Adyen CEO is greatly disturbed by the market demand for software engineers 😂

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

New year, new life. Claire and I are expecting our baby boy at the end of January!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

We have lived in the US for 18 months now and had to deal with more fraudulent charges on our cards and bank accounts (about $2000 😳) than in the previous 30 years of living in Europe (a nice round $0). I just don’t understand everyone is ok with this broken system.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

@paytmitch In the United States: Wire transfer at $15 per transaction Every other country: Just a regular instant bank transfer at no cost, because the government considers it “digital infrastructure” just like highways

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

De VVD vordert €360.000 aan bijstand terug, maar heeft geen probleem wanneer bedrijven €30 miljard voordeel krijgen

De Rotterdamse VVD

@VVDRotterdam

3 years

Tim over aanpak bijstandsfraude Je werkt hard, maar wil ook best wat bijdragen voor anderen die dat door pech even niet kunnen. Wat we níet doen is accepteren dat er misbruik van wordt gemaakt. Maar dat gebeurt helaas wel. Daarom zijn de onderzoeken bijstandsfraude uitgebreid.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Obama: “At each level [of society] you have this expectation that things are going to be more refined, more sophisticated, more thoughtful, rigorous, selfless, and it turns out it’s all still like high school”

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Caroline van der Plas (BBB) heeft liever varkens voor de export dan mensen 🤯

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@thijsniks

2 years

@Astr0b0y8 Gotta stay safe!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

We have to start taxing cars by weight, because that’s what causes pollution and injury

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Cycling fatality risk as deaths per billion trips (I added Amsterdam to the dataset)

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Our boy arrived on January 26 and we named him Marcus Alexander Niks! He weighs 3300g (p25) and is very healthy. His favorite activities are keeping us awake and listening to the dishwasher. Claire is recovering well and we are enjoying our time together.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Claire and I have decided to move from San Francisco to Paris, so we can live closer to family again. We have had an amazing few years in California and will miss the city, the people, and the nature!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

@warpling I mean, that would be nice but adding such a complex requirement probably pushes back the timeline by another 5 years so I’ll just take what I can get 😉

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

83% of Dutch neighborhoods (green dots) have a supermarket and pharmacy within a 15 minute bike ride

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

One of my favorite TikTok genres is people discovering that American banks don’t let you transfer money to other people

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Moedigt de ING klanten sinds kort aan om spaargeld weg te schrijven omdat de centrale bank rente negatief is?

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Het is vrij hilarisch en sneu hoe panisch Nederland over mondmaskers doet. Hier in San Francisco draagt 90% van de mensen er eentje als ze buiten de deur zijn. Niemand zeurt.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

I’m stoked that my team is launching a better version of WhatsApp group calling today! You can now join a call at any moment while it is ongoing, so you never have to miss one again

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 months

@Andric1961 Minor point, but Manchester doesn’t have a subway either

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

I love that Silicon Valley companies call 4 weeks off a sabbatical while that’s just an average August vacation in France

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

@JakeAnbinder Amsterdam city council came within 1 vote of putting a highway through its city center. And European cities have been reversing their bad urban planning for 30 years, while American cities haven’t done anything. So there have definitely been some better choices too.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

Here’s a random American fact to blow your mind: “The Gas Guzzler Tax […] apply only to passenger cars. Sport utility vehicles (SUV) are not covered because these vehicle types were not widely available in 1978” #climatecrisis

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

@KaseyKlimes I’m pretty convinced it’s all about the electoral system. European cities tend to have party-list proportional representation which leads to coalition governments with actual power, while American cities have FPTP districts with veto points everywhere

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

Pretty outrageous marketing push notifications for Apple TV+

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

A Dutch intersection “checks whether a bus is too early, on time, or running late and sets the [traffic] lights accordingly”

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

Separated bike lanes reduce a city’s traffic deaths by 44% and serious injuries by 50% 🤯

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Amsterdam: $87b Booking $65b Adyen $16b Takeaway

Bill Gurley

@bgurley

4 years

Michael - love to see entrepreneurship spread. To have a vibrant ecosystem, I think you need three independent public companies north of $10b market cap that were founded in region. @Chewy qualifies. Seattle has this, NYC just recently qualified. LA close. It can take a while.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

@MikeIsaac

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Starting today, mopeds finally have to pay for parking in Paris (€3 per hour) And the city will give you €400 for buying an ebike Can’t wait for people to ditch their noisy mopeds and switch to ebikes

Vélo électrique, vélo cargo, stages d'apprentissage…Les aides financières pour inciter à des...

Vélos à assistance électrique, vélos cargos, découverte de Mobilib'… La Ville de Paris propose des aides financières pour inciter à utiliser des modes de déplacements plus respectueux de l’environn...

www.paris.fr

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Same street in The Hague in 1978, 2014, and 2021 Via @bakfietsdc and @drmatthewhardy

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

@thezedwards Storing the first 6 and last 4 digits of a card number in plaintext is standard procedure and PCI compliant

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

In other countries, transferring money between bank accounts is instant and free

Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

The Fed charges 400x more for instant funds transfers than the ECB. And Wells Fargo charges 12,500x more… What’s the point of a “free market” if basic services are expensive?

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Finalized my home office setup

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

8 months

@ow “largest reply prioritization” 💀

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

The difference of course is that left NIMBYs don’t have a plan to make things happen so it ends up being conservatism, while Austria has a competent Social Democratic Party to effect progressive change

DEI speedwagon 🌹🇵🇸 〽️

@uhshanti

2 years

sat in on a presentation from the chief housing economists at the Austrian Chamber of Labor and kept chuckling to myself about how their myriad policy frameworks that facilitate swift development would be considered “left-NIMBYism”

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

@aka_pugs @PessimistsArc Robert Bachrach wrote a follow up to his memo decades later

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@thijsniks

1 year

Exactly 16 hours apart

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@thijsniks

3 years

Dutch authors taking #1 and #2 on the NYT nonfiction bestseller list

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@thijsniks

5 years

Be the reviewer you wish to see in the world

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

21 days

@thomasforth Is this one of those “but what if they catch on fire” stories because import controls are severely lacking and cheap Chinese batteries are flooding in? (Like NYC)

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

11 months

@FuckCarsReddit “Sustainable transport” in this case includes transit, which I guess is not active

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

The New York Times

@nytimes

3 years

Norway’s women's beach handball players were each fined 150 euros for wearing shorts rather than bikini bottoms. Men are allowed to wear shorts. A spokeswoman for the International Handball Federation said she did not know the reason for the rules.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

The most Belgian thing I have seen in a while: 🔴 Press the red button labeled “stop” in case of emergency 🔵 Press the blue button to request a tram stop Please don’t mess it up 🙄

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

@mgsiegler GDPR itself is wildly successful for European citizens (so much less spam and identity theft in the EU compared to the US), but poorly enforced by regulators on the web

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

Civilized train speeds

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Now that Apple is ok with promotional push notifications, they should require companies to classify their notifications and allow you to turn off the ads in Settings

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

5 years

Amazing — The mayor of Paris is campaigning for re-election on the promise to make a car-free city where everything is within a 15 minute walk.

Anne Hidalgo

@Anne_Hidalgo

5 years

La #VilleDuQuartDHeure , c’est quoi ? C’est la ville des proximités où l’on trouve tout ce dont on a besoin à moins de 15 minutes de chez soi. C’est la condition de la transformation écologique de la ville, tout en améliorant la vie quotidienne des Parisiens. ⤵️ #Hidalgo2020

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

We moved from SF to Paris in May and I have mostly missed the avocado and coffee so far. Paris has competent government, frequent transit, abundant retail, growing bike network, more affordable childcare, cheap healthcare, fantastic restaurants. It’s not afraid to be a city.

Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

Claire and I have decided to move from San Francisco to Paris, so we can live closer to family again. We have had an amazing few years in California and will miss the city, the people, and the nature!

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Toch fijn dat we opnieuw een routekaart hebben die opnieuw gebaseerd is op een tijdlijn in plaats van drempelwaarden En het onderwijs gaat eerder open, want de vaccinatiegraad is daar het laagst… ? Wat een clownshow 🤡

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

Proposals for what the Netherlands could do to increase the number of (tech) startups often boil down to “more subsidies.” Instead, we should consider 3 systemic changes: ⁃ Incentivize stock compensation ⁃ Simplify corporate bankruptcy ⁃ Ban non-compete clauses

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

1 year

Alfred E. Neuman

@Peteer

1 year

@thijsniks A possible work around for single purposes might be incognito mode?

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

8 years

Hey Samsung, maybe you shouldn’t advertise the Galaxy Note 7 in airplanes right now? Just sayin’

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@thijsniks

3 years

VVD

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@thijsniks

3 years

lol at american media trying to figure out how to display themselves as number 1

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@thijsniks

2 years

It’s fascinating to me that German highway signs use (easy to read) title case, while France and Italy use (hard to read) all caps

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

America loves ineffective disclaimers, signs, and warnings. For example, the front of @sfmta_muni trams has no fewer than 26 of them

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Pon, the largest Dutch car importer, recognized bikes as a car replacement a decade ago and is now the largest bicycle seller globally

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

To be honest though: I assume one of the spin-off effects Gurley expects from 3 decacorns is early employees using their stock option returns to reinvest in the ecosystem. Which doesn’t happen in Amsterdam, because Dutch companies are stingy.

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

7 months

@ChittiMarco That bike lane would be a lot more popular and protected if it didn’t go as far down as the car lanes do. Should be right along the pedestrian walkway

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 years

“Als RIVM-man Jaap van Dissel een te lastige vraag krijgt, zegt hij: ik ben maar adviseur, u moet bij de beleidsmakers zijn. Als bewindslieden geen goed antwoord hebben, wijzen zij juist naar de adviseurs.” — @KustawBessems

Evalueren wat er fout is gegaan moet juist wel zo snel mogelijk

www.volkskrant.nl

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

@femkesvs Because it is an unexpected delight that works really well and is awesome? Switching apps and copying numbers was such a widespread annoyance

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

4 months

Still so weird to me that this is not prefab like in Europe

Gordon Padelford

@GordonOfSeattle

4 months

The 4th Ave bakers (👷‍♀️) busy at working creating new loafs 🥖 (concrete bike lane barriers)

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Duurde jaren voordat er iets van compensatie voor de toeslagenaffaire was: €30.000 * 9.000 * 2 = €540 miljoen En de teststichting krijgt zonder moeite en zonder toezicht €925 miljoen om de evenementenbranche stil te houden

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

2 years

The French rail operator told California “they were leaving for North Africa, which was less politically dysfunctional”

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@thijsniks

1 year

@curious_founder People think about literal trees if you ask about the “environment,” not about the global climate

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@thijsniks

1 year

@BeardedGaragist And… that’s fine. 200 years is just not that old and 5 trees is not enough to matter. Building transit is orders of magnitude more important if we want to make our cities livable and save the planet

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@thijsniks

2 years

Juristen van de overheid die niks van wiskunde begrijpen…

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@thijsniks

6 years

I don’t understand why web developers can’t just stick to plain old html. It’s way too often that something fancy breaks functionality

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@thijsniks

5 years

@asymco @sofiahoflin I love the #Micromobility Handbook. Great story and style!

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@thijsniks

3 years

Many big tech companies use a Plan > Build > Ship approach, as opposed to Scrum or Agile

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

6 years

2018 app downloads: 🏆 WhatsApp 🎙 TikTok > Instagram 👯‍♀️ Facebook + Facebook Lite 📫 Messenger + Messenger Lite 🇮🇳 JioTV > Amazon Prime > Airtel TV ✌️ Uber Eats > McDonalds > Starbucks 💪 Uber > Google Maps 👌 Didi > Lyft Where is YouTube?

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@thijsniks

1 year

@jeffnovich Manhattan is a lot denser at 73,000 per sqm though (but that still doesn’t mean trash should just be stacked on the street)

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@thijsniks

2 years

To be clear, the Adyen CEO is worth $2.6 billion himself

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@thijsniks

7 years

“Apple’s AirPods have accounted for 85 percent of totally wireless headphone dollar sales in the U.S.”

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@thijsniks

4 years

Het RIVM stuurt nog steeds op een maximaal aantal besmettingen (en doden) in plaats van zo min mogelijk 😭

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Still bummed Biden isn’t fixing the payment system as part of his infrastructure bill

Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Upgrading to the FedNow real-time payment system should be part of Biden’s infrastructure package

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@thijsniks

2 years

Toch vrij hilarisch dat de QR code scanner van de NS poortjes niet meer werkt sinds ze OV-Pay aan het testen zijn, want dat activeert Apple Pay en neemt het scherm over

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

Following Olympic athletes on TikTok is the real gold of these games

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@thijsniks

3 years

Apple changed the iPhone keyboard layout years ago and 50% of by Google search queries still have unnecessary dots in them

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@thijsniks

1 year

Apple’s example of using Vision Pro to take a video of your children playing is deeply sad and has strong Google Glass vibes

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Thijs Niks

@thijsniks

3 years

The quote tweets of this are filled with people who are precious about Ancient Computer Truths which apparently shouldn’t be changed. At least Twitter is doing a good job keeping these garbage replies out of my notifications

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