Business Twitter hit with mass resignations after Elon Musk's ‘hardcore’ ultimatum - and nothing of value was lost

Twitter hit with mass resignations after Elon Musk's ‘hardcore’ ultimatum

Elon Musk is now facing a new crisis at Twitter as a wave of employees seemed to reject his ultimatum of an “extremely hardcore” Twitter 2.0 or leave the company.

ca.finance.yahoo.com

Twitter hit with mass resignations after Elon Musk's ‘hardcore’ ultimatum​

Karissa Bell
·Senior Editor
Thu, November 17, 2022 at 8:43 p.m.·2 min read

Elon Musk is now facing a new crisis at Twitter as a wave of employees seemed to reject his ultimatum of an “extremely hardcore” Twitter 2.0 or leave the company. Hours after a deadline for workers to check “yes” on a Google form accepting “long hours at high intensity, it seems a large number of employees have rejected Musk’s vision.

Exactly how many employees opted for severance over remaining at Twitter isn’t yet clear. The New York Times reported the number was in the “hundreds,” while other early reports suggest the number could be much higher. The departures come after Musk already cut 50 percent of Twitter’s jobs in mass layoffs.

On Twitter, dozens of Twitter employees who had survived the initial round of layoffs tweeted farewell messages. One employee tweeted a video of a group of workers inside Twitter’s office counting down to the 5pm ET deadline on Musk’s ultimatum. “We’re all about to get fired,” he said.

Others tweeted messages alluding to Musk’s policies. In his Wednesday morning message, Musk had said that “only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”

As the deadline approached, Musk reportedly grew concerned about how many remaining employees could leave the company. In a new memo, he appeared to walk back some of his earlier comments banning all remote work, though he still said he would fire managers if remote workers on their teams weren’t performing.

But it seems the concession wasn’t enough for many at Twitter Platformer’s Zoe Schiffer reported Thursday that Musk and his lieutenants were struggling to figure out just how many employees had declined to check the “yes” box on his Google form, and that Twitter would be closing down access to its offices for a few days as an extra precaution.

The departures raise new questions about whether the remaining Twitter engineers will be able to reliably keep the service up and running. Current and former employees are already speculating that the latest exodus could further put Twitter’s ability to function at risk, especially with the start of the World Cup a few days away.

Twitter no longer has communications staff, but Musk so far hasn't publicly commented on the resignations.

- end of article -​

I like how they try to frame it as musk 'facing a crisis' when they did exactly what he wanted and expected them to do. Fucking manipulative journos

 

[TowinKarz]

layoffs/walkouts aren't going to be what kills twitter. our labor doesn't have that kind of power to change things anymore.
imo what kills twitter- there will probably be a new social media site in a month that every corporate channel shills nonstop. maybe timed with some scandal where someone does something violent on twitter.

Actually, it does. As the big trucker protests show.

It's that to have that kind of power, you have to be important, not self-important.

You have to have value to others OUSIDE your immediate peer group.

The guy who drives the truck that brings the gas to the corner store's absence will be felt much harder and faster than the lost of 5,000 DEI directors..... Musk is just proving that 10% of the workforce is all you need to run Twitter because the other 90% were useless eaters (or non-eaters as the cafeteria bill showed) who did nothing but the kind of content-policing everyone who isn't a raging libtard hates, and did it half-assed and for 10 minutes a day.... nobody's gonna miss them.

It wasn't well optimized but it wasn't constantly offline. Journos last night were acting like if there were less than 500 people in the building at all times the servers would burst into flames and die.

Yes, the same people who proudly said they only ever came to the office once a week for 3 hours and did 15 minutes of work while there, who said it was cruel to end free meals and free yoga, who likely operated in a way that meant there weren't 500 people in the building at any time for the last 2 years... are now CERTAIN the place is doomed if 500 people aren't there 24/7 and ready to work. Funny.

 

[A Cardboard Box]

This is all fine except for the remote work bit, so I'm glad he walked that back. Hybrid or remote work is absolutely expected and normal in the tech industry; especially for companies who insist on having retarded open plan offices (because IT takes concentration which is hard to find when the guy from Sales talks at 97 dB for 7 hours a day). Even your good tech employees will quit if you try to take it away.

I do find it odd that the culture seems to be that you can say whatever you want about the company and it's bosses in public. Must be a SF thing; you try that anywhere else and they'll shitcan you.

It really does conjure up the image of some shitty student union "demanding" things from the school's administrators, like they all still think they're at Berkley...

Demanding workers dedicate their time beyond 40 hours a week to work is absolutely not expected nor should it be normalized. It's the same argument I make about "crunch time" in the video game sector, it's unfair and wrong. People should work to live, not live to work. Expecting people, fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, to sleep at the fucking office and sweat bullets over the prospect of being fired for "underperformance," whatever the fuck that means at a social media company, for a fucking paycheck, is absurd.

Musk is a piece of shit. Just because he thinks it's okay to be a shitty absent father and husband doesn't mean it's everyone else's prerogative as well. I'm a red blooded American and want to string hippie San Fran faggots up from lampposts, too, but I would absolutely leave my job if my boss sent me this retarded fucking ultimatum.

 

[derpherp2]

Why wouldn’t one leave? If you’re an engineer with valuable skills there is no future left at Twitter.

Staying ensures long hours, bad conditions, and getting stuck with H1B foreigners who don’t have the luxury of leaving.

Kiwis think it’s all HR and moderators leaving, but those people have the least leverage and the fewest options open to them. Instead Elon is going to lose lots of critical employees who aren’t near as simple to replace once that tribal engineering knowledge is gone.

Twitter is going down and anyone intelligent/capable is fleeing the ship.

To be fair it's probably less Elon and more the gibs from the gubbmint is going to go dry very soon.
Not like a Social Media site needs a lot of employees anyways.

The meltdown last night was the funniest Twitter has been in years. People legitimately thought the site would be dead within hours. It's hilarious how many "tech journalists" seem to think a platform like twitter needs a massive staff, when it ran fine with a skeleton crew for its first half-decade of existence, and that was back when they were running everything on their own hardware instead of AWS.

Starting to think that "dot com" boom retards keep harping about was overhyped if the techies it made were this retarded tbh.

 

[Meat Target]

It wasn't well optimized but it wasn't constantly offline. Journos last night were acting like if there were less than 500 people in the building at all times the servers would burst into flames and die.

Where can I find this? Jersh needs to re-open the salt mines. What was it about last night in particular?

 

[Haramburger]

A bunch of tranny jannies are out of work? Well I'm sure this place has a few mod positions available.

Don't ResetEra the farms up, even in jest

 

[Plumber's Kokoro Wish]

At least not for a few years, all they tech companies are laying off right now not hiring, I hope they cant find work. Perhaps Starbucks would be a good fit.

Oh no, he wants a meritocracy and not a source of free income for dangerhair retards.

I'm more concerned these dipshits will migrate and poz other companies.

 

[Next Task]

Kiwis think it’s all HR and moderators leaving, but those people have the least leverage and the fewest options open to them.

The problem with that is it requires them to know that. It's been shown that moderators and HR all through tech have hugely inflated senses of their own importance.

It also doesn't help that impression when the 'reporting' on all this is full of articles lamenting the firing of those sorts of employees, but all reports on technical people being fired/leaving is 99% 'sources say' and insinuations rather than anyone willing to go on record to say that it's happening. A woman who worked 'combating political misinformation' gets a fawning article about how her Christmas won't be as lavish this year because she was fired, but these supposed integral engineers aren't being directly talked to.

Sure, Musk could be getting rid of important employees as well. But I'd say it's guaranteed that, irrespective of whether he is or not, all the journalists who hate him for taking away their drug supply are happily trying to make things sound as bad as possible in any way they can. So they're going to keep on reporting he's fucking everything up and he's ruining Twitter, no matter what he's actually doing.

It's going to take a while for all this to shake out. But it's still a win if Musk is actually fucking up with who is leaving Twitter, because fuck Twitter.

 

[Absolutego]

Starting to think that "dot com" boom retards keep harping about was overhyped if the techies it made were this retarded tbh.

It's not the techies saying this, it's the "tech/culture" journalists. It's just another manifestation of the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect.

 

[Matt Damon]

Instead Elon is going to lose lots of critical employees who aren’t near as simple to replace once that tribal engineering knowledge is gone.

Tribal engineering knowledge? It's a glorified web forum running (I think) on Amazon's platform.

It's not some arcane, esoteric technology that nobody else understands. Literally any competent web developer already knows essentially what Twitter is doing and can be brought up to speed in a matter of weeks.

 

[NotFatChild]

How was twitter generating enough revenue to keep all those dangerhairs employed and happy?, Wouldnt they have gone under regardless of Musk stepping in?.

It wasn't. The company was talking about cutting staff by 75% before elon bought it.

 

[Two Dollars]

Twitter is faggy.
Engaging in Twitter is faggy.
Working for Twitter is faggy.

But leaving Twitter now of all times - now that it’s beginning to show potential of being a halfway decent social media platform - is the faggiest of all.

 

[Ancient Pioneer]

The meltdown last night was the funniest Twitter has been in years. People legitimately thought the site would be dead within hours. It's hilarious how many "tech journalists" seem to think a platform like twitter needs a massive staff, when it ran fine with a skeleton crew for its first half-decade of existence, and that was back when they were running everything on their own hardware instead of AWS.

Please tell me they're seriously not running 100% of the site on AWS. No fucking wonder they're bleeding money, AWS is for spillover traffic when you get a massive fucking spike out of nowhere.

 

[The Last Stand]

This is all fine except for the remote work bit, so I'm glad he walked that back. Hybrid or remote work is absolutely expected and normal in the tech industry; especially for companies who insist on having retarded open plan offices (because IT takes concentration which is hard to find when the guy from Sales talks at 97 dB for 7 hours a day). Even your good tech employees will quit if you try to take it away.

It's actually cheaper to oppose remote work options for the tech field as it cuts costs on office renting.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

long hours at high intensity

Is there a copy of what was said? Because it's probably the usual 9-5 with no yoga lessons inbetween.

 

[kcbbq]

Is there a copy of what was said? Because it's probably the usual 9-5 with no yoga lessons inbetween.

The only thing I saw from Musk was telling people he expected 40 hours a week from them and remote was cancelled.

 

[byuu]

Is there a copy of what was said? Because it's probably the usual 9-5 with no yoga lessons inbetween.

Elon Musk emailed Twitter Inc. employees demanding that they commit to “long hours at high intensity” or leave, further roiling a staff already dealing with sweeping layoffs, mass executive departures and repeated business missteps under the billionaire’s ownership.

Twitter employees must fill out a Google form by Thursday, 5 p.m. ET, to indicate if they want to remain at the company and are willing to work an intense regimen, according to the overnight email from Mr. Musk that many employees woke up to on Wednesday, with the subject line “A Fork in the Road.” Those who opt not to commit would be given three months of severance, he said.

“Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore,” Mr. Musk wrote in the email, which was viewed by The Wall Street Journal. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.“

https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-gives-twitter-staff-an-ultimatum-work-long-hours-at-high-intensity-or-leave-11668608923

Really a great way to scare off anyone skilled who have many other options.

 

[Kane Lives]

Is there a copy of what was said? Because it's probably the usual 9-5 with no yoga lessons inbetween.

https://twitter.com/donie/status/1592859900941852674

This is the actual text of what was sent out. Note the lack of actual numbers beyond platitudes about needing to work long hours and exceptional performance.

 

[Catler]

Tribal engineering knowledge? It's a glorified web forum running (I think) on Amazon's platform.

It's not some arcane, esoteric technology that nobody else understands. Literally any competent web developer already knows essentially what Twitter is doing and can be brought up to speed in a matter of weeks.

I guarantee it’s more complex than that even if it shouldn’t be. Young hotshot engineers with big ideas and something to prove? Twitter is probably needlessly complex with all kind of meme technologies, solutions, and make work projects.

I know that a lot of Amazon teams have this issue, I can’t imagine Twitter isn’t suffering it to some degree as well.

 

[Rich Evans Ayypologist]

I'm gonna get to laugh at twitter retards watching their green pastures going up in flames AND laugh at retards who thought that Musk would somehow save twitter and make it based at once? Christmas is coming early!

 

[Cubanodun]

I'm more concerned these dipshits will migrate and poz other companies.

The Zucc and Lord Bezos are already trimming the fat in their own companies, i heard McDonald has good hourly rate now