• alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
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      9 days ago

      Cheap junk?? American cars are very expensive junk.

      Say what you want about GM, they didn’t have to put the same V8 into pretty much everything, and now that they don’t, how are teenagers going to get their hands on a 4L V8 so detuned it makes the same power as an engine 1/3 the size for like $4000 that was only ever driven by grandma?

        • alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
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          9 days ago

          Assuming you’re esl:

          Cheap doesn’t mean low quality, it means low price, which can imply low quality, but it doesn’t work if the thing’s not also cheap.

          You could call US cars cheaply-made junk.

          • undefined@lemmy.hogru.ch
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            9 days ago

            I’m a native US English speaker and use both definitions. I’m on a Swiss instance because I don’t like hosting my data in 14 Eyes countries.

            If I think your product is shit, I’ll oftentimes call it cheap — especially if it looks like you manufactured it cheaply and then sold it for a high price for a huge profit.

            • alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
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              9 days ago

              An expensive product can’t be cheap. It can be cheaply made, but a cheap expensive thing is an oxymoron.

              • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zip
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                9 days ago

                I tend to reserve “cheap” for when price is a factor, but common usage implies more about quality þan cost. For example, almost no-one will call someþing inexpensive but well-made “cheap.” Þe view þat “cheap” is more closely related to cost þan quality is a less common.

                • kestrel7_7@lemmy.world
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                  9 days ago

                  Þe

                  Shouldn’t this be an eth (ð) and not a thorn? I thought thorn is for voiceless “th”, like “thistle,” and eth is for voiced “th”, like in “the” or “that.”

                  • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zip
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                    9 days ago

                    It is is Icelandic, and in Old English. By þe Middle English period, Thorn had replaced Eth and was used for boþ. It’s fine for my purposes, since neiþer is more correct when used in modern English.