{"id":888546,"date":"2022-11-18T17:19:31","date_gmt":"2022-11-18T17:19:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/radiofree.asia\/?guid=057fd0ad90f810431793c0f97bcf6850"},"modified":"2022-11-18T17:19:31","modified_gmt":"2022-11-18T17:19:31","slug":"musks-hardcore-twitter-ultimatum-backfires-spectacularly-as-hundreds-resign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/11\/18\/musks-hardcore-twitter-ultimatum-backfires-spectacularly-as-hundreds-resign\/","title":{"rendered":"Musk\u2019s \u201cHardcore\u201d Twitter Ultimatum Backfires Spectacularly as Hundreds Resign"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elon Musk\u2019s ultimatum this week to the remainder of Twitter\u2019s workforce \u2014 to commit to a \u201chardcore\u201d work culture with \u201c<\/span>long hours at high intensity<\/span><\/a>\u201d or leave \u2014 has backfired spectacularly as hundreds of workers have opted out and are resigning, leaving the company with a barebones staff that may not have the capacity to keep the website afloat.<\/span><\/p>\n

The roughly <\/span>2,000<\/span><\/a> to 3,000 workers left at the company earlier this week had until 5 pm on Thursday to click \u201cyes\u201d on a form committing to the \u201chardcore\u201d culture \u2014 what Musk calls \u201cTwitter 2.0\u201d \u2014 or receive three months severance. <\/span>The Verge<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>The New York Times<\/span><\/i> have reported<\/span><\/a> that hundreds of resignations started rolling in before the deadline; <\/span>Fortune<\/span><\/i> reported<\/span><\/a> that about 75 percent of the remaining employees opted out of \u201cTwitter 2.0,\u201d with most of the 25 percent remaining on work visas, with little choice but to stay.<\/span><\/p>\n

Musk <\/span>had already laid off roughly half of the 7,500<\/span><\/a> workers at the company shortly after he took the helm and <\/span>has spent recent days<\/span><\/a> firing workers who have criticized him on workplace messaging platform Slack or on Twitter, meaning that there could be only hundreds of employees left at the company.<\/span><\/p>\n

Employees and former employees say that Musk has created an extremely dire situation for the website, essentially manufacturing a ticking time bomb counting down the days \u2014 or hours \u2014 until critical functions stop working. <\/span>The Washington Post<\/span><\/i> reported<\/span><\/a> after the deadline had passed that many of the teams on critical systems \u2014 \u201clike \u2018serving tweets\u2019 levels of critical,\u201d as a former employee said \u2014 no longer have any staff. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no longer even a skeleton crew manning the system,\u201d the employee said. \u201cIt will continue to coast until it runs into something, and then it will stop.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEvery mistake in code and operations is now deadly,\u201d added a former engineer. Any employees who have remained \u201care going to be overwhelmed, overworked, and because of that more likely to make mistakes.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That Musk appears to be intent on creating a toxic work environment is consistent with his management style at his other companies. Corporate workers at Tesla, for instance, <\/span>have reported<\/span><\/a> a \u201ccult-like\u201d culture of worshiping the multibillionaire among the staff, while workers at Tesla\u2019s California warehouse have <\/span>sued several times<\/span><\/a> over what they say is a <\/span>heinous culture of rampant racism<\/span><\/a> and harassment on the warehouse floor.<\/span><\/p>\n

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If only we had taxed the rich maybe none of this would have happened<\/p>\n

\u2014 Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 18, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n