As a longtime resident of Denmark now living in Norway, I’m often asked what’s different between the Danes and Norwegians. I’ve already posted about the service industry in the two countries. And over the last few months, I’ve begun to notice another major difference: the idea of a good time is completely opposite.

The Norwegian attitude is expressed wonderfully in this passage from Odd Børretzen’s book How to Understand and Use a Norwegian: A User’s Guide.

“[The Norwegian] wants the time he spends with other people to result in something sensible, or enable him to:
1. learn from it
2. have a child by it, or
3. obtain a good Fisheries Agreement.
The Norwegain has never quite understood how people from other lands can find it morally justifiable to sit in a pub, at a sidewalk cafe, or in a marketplace for hours, and talk about anything for no other purpose than just sitting there talking.”

The more time I spend in Norway, the more I realise this is true. Norwegians love to be doing something in their spare time. They climb mountains, go fishing, walk the coast, sew, better themselves. The idea of doing ‘nothing’ is thoroughly alien.

Compare this to the Danes, whose idea of a good time is nothing but sitting and chatting with friends.

I saw this sign on the Metro and have come to the conclusion that it’s a classic example of bad writing.

“There may be camera surveillance on all Metro trains…” is about as vague as it gets. Either there is camera surveillance on all trains or there isn’t. Without being able to understand the Danish version, I’m guessing that the issue is all. There may be camera surveillance on some Metro trains… makes sense.

But the problem could also be with the modal verb may. In which case, the sentence could read: There is camera surveillance on all Metro trains… .

This is an example of good intentions going to waste because of poor execution. While us non-Danish speakers appreciate the effort put in to giving us information in English, the effort is pointless if the English version isn’t checked for accuracy (and sense).

And it’s a lesson for all writers, whether writing in English or any other language. The written word is fixed and the reader rarely has a chance to double-check the meaning. So you have to be 100% clear in what you write…and the reader must be left in no doubt. For me, this is the number 1 golden rule and it is more important than style, tone of voice or conciseness. Because if the reader doesn’t understand, you’ve failed in your main goal.

So what’s the best way to ensure your writing is clear? Ask someone else to read it - because although it may make sense you, it may not be clear to the reader.

But back to the Metro. There is one more possibility. It’s possible that the Metro authorities don’t know if there is camera surveillance on all trains or not - in which case, they’d be better off not writing anything.

There’s something funny about the Danish lunch break. It doesn’t really exist. It’s 30 minutes of quick eating, a short chat and then straight back to work. Is this a good idea?

As an Englishman, I grew up in world where lunch is long and leisurely. In the UK, a one-hour lunch is considered the minumum and two hours is not unheard of. People use their lunch breaks to rest, read the newspaper or do some stuff in town. I remember my teenage years working on building sites where the one-hour lunch was the most wonderful time of day. Starving after a morning’s work, I’d eat slowly and then still have 25 minutes to find a quiet spot in the shade for a quick nap. Wonderful.

In Denmark, you barely have time to swallow before it’s back to work - which at first glance seems pretty paltry. But, there’s a huge upside to this. In the UK, it’s not unusual to start work at 9am and not get home until well past 6pm. Sure, you can enjoy a long lunch, but isn’t that time better spent at home with your family? With the short Danish lunch break, people often leave work around 4 pm - and have a full evening ahead of them.

There’s also the beauty of the Danish canteen. My brother was on a visit recently and I told him the story of a Danish friend of mine who took the quality of the canteen into consideration when taking a job. My brother was (a) shocked that this was important to him and (b) surprised that so many work places have a canteen. I guess if you only have 30 minutes to eat, you don’t have time to pop out to the sandwich shop - so having food provided is essential.

Sometimes the simplest ideas are just the best. And here is a great one. Visit FreeRice.com and you can practice your English vocabulary and learn new words.

And at the same time, you generate grains of rice to food programmes through the United Nations. The connection between English vocab and rice isn’t clear to me - but it doesn’t matter because the site is addictive and for a good cause.

It’s simple, you are given a word and have to choose the correct synonym from four options. And the site adjusts to your abilities, so the more you get right, the harder it gets. And each time you get an answer right, the site donates 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Programme.

The concept is simple, too. The rice comes from sponsors who advertise on the site.

Go and try it! If you already know the answer, someone gets some rice. If you don’t know the answer, you learn a new word. It’s win-win.

Our old friend Aaron sent us word of a great link. normann copenhagen is “a design company - with an opinion” and a passion for plastic dogs. The blog shows interesting views from around the world and doesn’t hold its punches when it comes to saying what it thinks of what it sees.

The safety scissors particularly caught my attention - a great example of pointless packaging.

Check it out for some examples of good and bad design around Copenhagen and the globe.

I was sitting on the toilet at the office this morning and couldn’t help but notice the text on the packet of toilet paper beside me. Apparently, the toilet paper we use at work is T4 System. This is what is says on the pack:

Toilet Paper
Roll
T4 System

T4 System? This sounds pretty fancy, huh? Perhaps some amazing technology or cutting-edge new way of creating extra strength and absorbtion? No, it turns out that the T4 System decribes:

1. The number of sheets
2. The length of the roll
3. The height of the roll
4. The fact that it’s two ply

The T4 System? Isn’t good enough to simply write toilet paper and leave it at that?

Yesterday, I was doing what should have been a very short bit of research. But in the end, it took me ages, absolutely ages. The reason was poorly described links.

I was on the Interbuild website. Interbuild is a big trade fair in the UK for the construction industry and I was writing material for an architectural firm going to the event. Quite simply, I wanted to check out some other architectural firms that were attending to see what they were writing. Should have been simple, no?

Not on Interbuild’s website. Conveniently, the website lists all the attendees alphabetically and each company name is a link to further information. BUT, the link is nothing but a company name. Fine if you know the company, but far too much random clicking if you don’t. What’s the point in giving a list of names if you don’t tell the reader what the names mean? These firms come from all over the world and every area of the building industry, there’s no way someone would know them all.

So, to my rant. I hate links that don’t tell you what you’re going to find when you get there! Please, please, please, if you going to send me somewhere, tell me where I’m going!

For those of you who haven’t been there yet, it’s seriously worth visiting PostSecret. What started off as an art project has become ‘the largest advertisement-free blog on the web’ with well over 1 million hits. But that isn’t why I like it. I visit it because it’s human, funny and entertaining. And if I feel like it, I can take part.

Most people (above a certain age) will recognize Dylan’s iconic 1965 video Subterranean Homesick Blues. To promote the release of Dylan’s greatest hits, the cue card sequence has been adapted so users can generate their own messages and send them to friends. Try it - it’s very neatly done.

So, will it work? My gut feeling is no. The average Dylan fan is around my dad’s age – and not computer savvy enough to send messages to friends through a pop video, however old the video is. No doubt the greatest hits album is aimed at new fans and people who simply want some Dylan in their collection, so the target audience for the ad campaign is not die-hard Dylan fans. But still, I’m not convinced. There are plenty of artists out there whose videos would be ripped by the million - but we’re looking at another generation.

By the way, I found out about this at MediaSoon – a great place to find out how the advertising industry is using new media and adapting old.

A new site from The Nielsen Company could mark the beginning of a beautiful friendship between the public and movie, TV and music producers. The social network site gives users the chance to comment on, review and rate entertainment. The site then collates the reviews and general media buzz to produce star ratings for the shows, films and songs.

There’s nothing new here, until you look a little deeper. The beauty of Hey! Nielsen is its promise to unite the public with decision-makers in the companies that produce entertainment.

The Hey! Nielsen website claims:

“…the exclusive access and power of Nielsen means that your opinions not only reach millions of people via the web, but may also reach the media moguls who decide what goes on the air and on the web. The more heat your postings generate, the greater the chance your opinions will land on the most influential inboxes in the biz…”

The site is supported by Nielsen’s sister sites Billboard.com, HollywoodReporter.com, and BlogPulse.com, some of the most influential sites in the industry. So there’s a good chance that users’ opinions will be read by powerful people.

Could this collatable SMO approach be beneficial for other industries? Sure, few things create as much public interest as entertainment. But imagine having such a simple, one-stop barometer for consumer goods. Apple might have benefitted from this kind of feedback before locking down the iPhone (which led to numerous bad reviews, like this one from Gizmodo). Or in other industries, from paint coatings to switch manufacturing, a tool for collating public opinion could give producers insight into what people want, like, dislike and need – like easy to manage focus groups – enabling them to create the right products to suit their customers.

Sound neat, huh?