for cloud/VPS hosting hetzner has been solid for me. their object storage is S3-compatible and way cheaper than AWS. the only downside is the region options are limited to EU which is actually a feature if you're targeting EU users. for the directory question, euro-stack.com linked above looks more maintained than european-alternatives.eu. i also just search "X alternative EU" whenever i need something specific

Thanks! I'm also a happy Hetzner customer (for 4 or 5 years now?), can vouch for their object and box storage, and cloud VPS. I also already loved learning about euro-stack.com and end up doing the same as you (searching for EU alternative).