When we were recording this week’s Gossip with Celebitchy podcast, CB mentioned that she saw something about Elon Musk ending remote work for Twitter employees. I saidthat I thought that was just for Tesla employees, and while that’s true, it turns out that Twitter’s remaining employees are not allowed to do remote work either. CB was right! (She told me that she already edited that part out of the pod anyway!) Elon Musk ordered the handful of remaining Twitter staffers to report to work in the office. Musk did so in his first inter-office email after firing 50% of the staff. But that’s not all! Musk also said some crazy sh-t about how Twitter is going to make money after he f–ked it all up with the advertisers.
Two weeks after closing a $44 billion deal to buy Twitter, Elon Musk sent emails to the employees of the social media company late on Wednesday, his first communications with them after mass layoffs and high-pressure drives to create new products.
In two emails seen by The New York Times, Mr. Musk painted a bleak financial picture for Twitter and outlined changes at the company, including an end to its remote work policy and a renewed focus on generating revenue and fighting spam.
“Sorry that this is my first email to the company, but there is no way to sugarcoat the message,” Mr. Musk, 51, wrote in one email. “The economic picture ahead is dire.” Twitter was too heavily dependent on advertising and vulnerable to pullbacks in brand spending, he added, and would need to bolster the revenue it gets from subscriptions.
In another note to employees, he wrote that “the absolute top priority is finding and suspending any verified bots/trolls/spam.”
Mr. Musk’s emails came as Twitter continues to be roiled by his changes. Last week, he cut about 50 percent of the company’s 7,500 employees. At the same time, Mr. Musk has been pushing for product changes that would help Twitter make more money, including promoting a subscription product. He previously said the company was losing $4 million a day.
Twitter, whose communication department has been almost entirely laid off, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Bloomberg earlier reported Mr. Musk’s emails.
On Wednesday, three top Twitter executives responsible for security, privacy and compliance also resigned, according to two people familiar with the matter and internal documents seen by The Times.
No remote work, no communications office, no security and privacy people, next to no ad revenue and Elon Musk’s biggest f–king priority is ferreting out “verified” spam/bots? Like… what? What is his obsession with bots? Bots are a problem, in general, but bots are not the reason why Twitter is in freefall. Musk wouldn’t be in such dire financial straits if only he had a bare minimum of executive or managerial competence either – literally, the advertisers just wanted some assurance that Musk wasn’t going to turn Twitter into a Nazi playground and he could not even give them that assurance. So of course the ad revenues are going down. And I’m sorry, hanging all of his hopes on subscribers? LMAO. There are 396.5 million Twitter users. I doubt even 2% of them would pay to subscribe to Elon’s Nazi ego trip.
Speaking of how much money Musk is losing, he also told Twitter employees that bankruptcy is definitely on the table. Oh my f–ing god.
In a bankruptcy, the banks that lent Musk the money to buy Twitter would likely end up owning much or all of the company and Musk and his co-investors would see their equity diluted heavily or wiped out. https://t.co/IA6136mAzs
— Vikas Bajaj (@vikasbajaj) November 10, 2022
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277542, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277550, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277560, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277574, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- Heidi Klum’s 21st Annual Halloween Party Presented By Now Screaming x Prime Video And Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur At Sake No Hana At Moxy Lower East Side Featuring: Elon Musk Where: New York, New York, United States When: 31 Oct 2022 Credit: ROGER WONG/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images
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- Heidi Klum’s 21st Annual Halloween Party Presented By Now Screaming x Prime Video And Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur At Sake No Hana At Moxy Lower East Side Featuring: Elon Musk Where: New York, New York, United States When: 31 Oct 2022 Credit: ROGER WONG/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images
It’s hard to imagine how much more fucked up this situation could get, but every day is a fresh hell. I will say the spoofing and parody going on (purchased blue checks named for real brands using their new accounts to make social commentary, e.g., @LockheedMartin) is highly entertaining!
someone did that for Eli Lilly, I believe, and announced that going forward insulin will be free for everyone.
they did it to Pepsi as well (tweet about how coke is better), there was a pretty funny exchange between Elonverified Ben Shapiro & Ted Cruz accounts, and some hysterical (probably accurate) tweets from an Elonverified Tesla account
If there are bot accounts that are verified, they have been verified under Musk’s regime
here’s the link to someone who’s shared some screenshots https://twitter.com/KT_So_It_Goes/status/1590905940798500864
the verified @Teslareal account was suspended pretty quickly
I predict that very soon, when you look up the word douche in the dictionary, you will simply see a picture of this man.
Ha ha ha!
Please let it be his puffed up tuxedo pic above! Kaiser on top of the funny pics as always!
Bots are bad!
-Says the guy who literally builds bots
He has no ad revenue and he’s not offering anything that would prompt an individual to subscribe. The business is collapsing and hemorrhaging cash. At this point he is probably only thinking about how he can keep a hold on Tesla and that means bankruptcy court and discharged loans. Down the line, someone will buy the IP and stand up a replacement with a better outlook for advertising and a worthwhile subscription service.
Just another self-important dude rising to the level of his own incompetence—these bozos never know when to get off the ride.
I don’t think he’ll be able to file for bankruptcy. I think he’s going to go to jail for fraud.
And his fanboys still worship him. Thank god he’s ineligible to run for US President.
Idk I know everyone is like he’s such an idiot. But I think this was his game from the beginning…Twitter is one of the main social medias where people can interact quickly with everyone from political reps, journalists, companies, unions, and other activists. I think by destroying Twitter verification it destroys messages created from those sources. So helps him and his “friends” from people unionizing, gaining instant knowledge, and also his friends saying well anyone can get verification. I’d like to see who helps bail him out. I think it’s to destroy the town hall feel of Twitter and to make it more difficult for mass communication.
This is a guy who got on an investor call high AF and didn’t care who knew it—don’t give him too much credit.
But its not like some other platform can’t take Twitter’s place. This seems like a lot to stop union organizing and activists.
There are a lot of people who think this is all part of some bigger nefarious plan. That Elon is some secret genius or just a puppet for Putin, the Saudi’s and the Chinese to control discourse. But that’s an awfully big bet. People are going to lose tens of billions of dollars for what?
Yes Twitter was major at one time, but these things come and go. There are other social media platforms. New ones will rise. Unless they kill ALL social media, I don’t see how this so called nefarious plan will work.
Also, you can’t predict how the masses will end up responding to this.
Right – those governments absolutely have the capacity to just hack in and blow Twitter up… especially now that nobody is minding the store. Elon being Elon is just a bonus.
Yes, it’s not a nefarious plan, it’s the evolution of a technology and how it’s used. I’m old enough to remember the collapse of cell phone stocks, but now everybody has one. Lots of people were wiped out back then – my company’s pension plan was wiped out (thanks very much) – but people have since become billionaires on the back of this technology.
Really? He spent $44 billion (that he doesn’t actually have) to tank Twitter to own the libs?
The simplest explanation is that Mummy’s Special Boy is so high on his own farts that this is where the trip took him.
Leveraged buyout.
Musk actually did not spend $44 billion, and certainly not of his own money.
Yes, I alluded to that in the parentheses.
That would be a crazy way to do that. And kind of senseless? The cat’s out of the bag in terms of social media. Yes, Twitter is the OG but any other platform can take its place. This form of communication isn’t going anywhere.
I think he’s just a worse businessman than everyone thought. None of this was necessary, he had the money and the cult following. I think he’s just a d*ck who bought his own hype. And got high too many times.
I hear ya. But I’m going with the simplest explanation. Occam’s razor.
You’re giving him too much credit.
Occam’s Razor. The man’s an idiot.
This is the man Tesla fanboys swear is a genius.
Sure, Chad. Sure.
I have to say, the collapse of Twitter is fascinating to watch. I feel like this episode is going to be taught in business schools (as a cautionary tale for how to not run a business) for the next century or so.
If free speech is so important to Elon, then why don’t he and his anti-woke followers just pay to keep the platform going themselves? Stop asking corporations and those of us who don’t want to propoagte hate to subsidize your selfish and bigoted fantasies.
Free speech doesn’t mean you don’t have to pay for it. You can have free speech on your cell phone, but you still have to pay the phone bill. The delivery system has a cost.
You break it you pay for it.
🙃
Good point.
I really feel for those employees. This has to have been an incredibly stressful few weeks and months. And all because some pencil dick megalomaniac with more money than sense keeps trying to make his own “mogul” dreams come true.
Disgusting.
Me too, at the same time we are laughing at Elon’s downfall it has to be heartbreaking for the employees to see everything they worked to build being destroyed like Koolaid man busting through a wall. Not to mention, if someone has been working remotely for years, they are somehow expected on 24 hours notice to show up at an office in California, no grace period to adjust family schedules, find childcare, and/or move closer, potentially hundreds or thousands of miles, to appear in person and sit at a computer all day —which they have been doing just as well or better at home—for no apparent reason other than to satisfy someone’s ego so he can occasionally stroll through the buildings and observe that he has employees. It also seems like a cynical way to get rid of more people without paying them severance as it will be impossible for some to get there immediately and every day as he demands.
@Chaine You just said all of the things I was thinking. This really, really sucks for the remote workers who were previously assured that remote work was a *permanent* allowance. It’s clear that Musk plans to keep moving the goalposts at will, with the goal of compelling as many employees as possible to quit voluntarily with no separation package. He thinks he’s playing 4D chess, and the employees (and users/customers/investors) are his pawns—but ultimately he’s just a dumb, evil person with too much money, power, and ego for his own good. I deeply hope for some measure of accountability and justice in the end.
@Chaine – Bingo. If he orders them to show up in the office and they don’t, is that considered “cause” for firing, thus providing cover for not paying severance?
Make no mistake, Elon is a monster. But yes, it must be terrible to be a Twitter employee right now and watching him destroy it all.
For the sake of the remaining hard working twitter employees just trying to keep it functional, I hope that his time controlling it is brief. It’s a shame that he couldn’t have bought and run something else, like Fox News , into the ground.
Oh. Do we know that elon has a pencil dick? Has any definitive statement been made, a la Stormi Daniels in regard to mushroom dick yrump? Enquiring minds want to know!
I think it’s only a matter of time before he turns Twitter into an MLM/pyramid scheme. There will be Twitter conventions, and Twitter merchandise, and people you barely remember from high school will keep asking you if you’ve heard the good news about Twitter. If you are able to sign up 5,000 paying subscribers, you’ll be rewarded with a 3 day weekend visiting the Musk family emerald mine.
@CC HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA “visiting the Musk family emerald mine” <– GENIUS
Isn’t he just following Trump’s m.o? The faster he can tank Twitter, the faster he can file for bankruptcy and walk away free?
What about his investors?
What an exhausting, destructive man. Some genius he is 🙄
For a company that is hemorrhaging cash flow, you would think he would be fine with remote workers. It saves a lot on facility costs. But I know he is a control freak that does not trust people to work 65-hour weeks unless he can see them do it. It is very old school thinking and I bet he will lose a lot of his best and brightest because they do not want to work in the labor camp he seems to be setting up. When my company was first exploring remote work my Director (Also very old school) was very much against it. So they fired him and now we are all remote workers. Some of us have moved across the country because we are not saddled with a city or office building.
At this point bankruptcy seems inevitable. There are bound to be lawsuits over this, there’s already the one brewing from the former employees.
I believe this was the plan all along, tanking it.
I’m with you.
Agreed. His plan was to destroy a public square standing in the way of a global fascist movement’s desire to take over all of western democracy.
He obliterated Twitter’s USP – as a trusted source of information by using a spiteful scorched earth approach.
What is it with people hating on remote work? I refuse to ever go back into an office for the line of work I do. I’ve been fully remote for 8 years with no issues.
Totally agree. My company gets more than its money’s worth out of those of us who work remote. I don’t ever want to go to an office again.
There is just a certain type of personality that hates remote work. They think you are just goofing off all day. And how do I feel more powerful if both you and I are working from home. Forcing people into an offer is just a power move to make sure people know you are ‘less than’ leadership. Who all hide at home all day.
And millions spent on empty office space is another issue. My company spent boat loads of money on a new office pre-pandemic. and it’s hardly used now. They are just itching to mandate return to office. But know the fallout with mass resignations is about the only thing from pulling that trigger. I don’t mind commuting for a meeting or work event. But to just go in and sit at a plastic desk. With no privacy and I get less done than working from home. Just does not sit right with me.
@AppleCart – “There is just a certain type of personality that hates remote work.” They’re called micromanagers and they do that because they have no confidence or trust.
Some micromanage because their managers micromanage, but however it happens, it’s a horrible, toxic culture that ultimately treats grown-ass professionals like three-year-olds. In my experience (40-year full-time professional in several different industries) this kind of culture can’t be fixed, and if you recognize it you should take your skills and run like hell.
He can write off the loss if he files bankruptcy. He knows exactly what he is doing.
What about his investors? How is the Tesla’s stocks are doing?
I am not leaving Twitter. I am not paying a red cent for using Twitter. The one who should go is Elon Musk. He should have never come to own Twitter in the first place. I hope he loses all his money and this could not be happening to a bigger a hole.
I think the company would have tanked, no matter what. The only questions were when and which sucker would get left holding the bag. Almost 90% of Twitter’s revenue comes from advertising and the rest comes from selling access to user data. The business model of providing a free service in exchange for advertising hasn’t worked well since the days of network TV and Twitter has never made a substantial profit in all the time it’s been public. There’s a reason why Dorsey can now safely apologize about his handling of the company – he found the sucker. And the sucker is now giving us a public show.
Jack has a lot of the same goofy “longtermerism” views Elon does, but I do think he played Elon here, which frankly, doesn’t seem too difficult.
I’m always amazed at people who cling to the belief that there’s a grand plan at play, that Elon, like Trump is playing chess while everyone else plays checkers. Could it just be that white men who inherit fortunes, exploit others & are allowed to fail up until their unfitness is finally exposed are just…frauds enabled by a white supremacist capitalist system? No, I’m sure it’s just some genius beyond my capacity to understand.
Yes, it’s like that old Barry Switzer quote,”some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple.”
Your assessment is perfect, Lizzie! It’s always white men failing up that bring the rest of us down.
I feel empathy for the employees. I’ve had 2 jobs in which the company went bankrupt and the employees, including me, did not get paid.
To hell with this fraud.
Musk is a snake oil salesman the same as Trump IMO.
Agreed. It is about the employees.
I feel for the remaining Twitter employees. Ironically I read on Twitter last night that those executives responsible for security, privacy and compliance who resigned did so because Snowflake is desperate to recoup his losses and has some nefarious schemes planned to gain revenue. Advertising $$$ doesn’t go half as far in sales as selling personal information. Billions of people on Twitter and he’s going to sell their data to every hack, spammer, dark web agents, bitcoin operators, and enemy operative for ready cash.
I also read that Meta, AKA Facebook, is also losing millions in revenue decline and stocks are falling. Unfortunately, layoffs are imminent too.
It doesn’t help that Meta has spent $36 billion on their Metaverse, which, so far, doesn’t work and nobody wants.
FB/Meta just fired 11,000 employees. These so-called social media giants are eating their own tails and I’m happy to see them crash and burn. However many thousands of lives are being ruined right now due to sudden job loss at a precarious time. What cruel inhuman monsters these guys are and there’s a special place in hell waiting for them.
Agreed. And that they always go these mass layoffs during the holiday season, all so they can claim they made a profit.
I wish hell didn’t have to wait.
I’ve been wondering all along if he has intermediaries shorting the F out of Twitter stock. Its not his first blatant stock manipulation.
Twitter no longer has stock, it became private when Elon bought it. But Tesla stock now … 🤔
Look, we knew he wasn’t smart, he’s shown he’s not smart, he’s messing up Tesla’s stock to boot, and thinks people are going to pay to subscribe to Twitter now. He’s crazy. Too many people have walked because this clown is going to catch a federal case at this point.
People just don’t learn from earlier platforms.
Too much messing around at the top made Livejournal and Tumblr have users jump ship.
Tumblr still exists and has some active users (it’s not a total ghost town), but it’s also not the powerhouse it once was.
Very true. Once LJ started messing with paid accounts and features, it went downhill from there. Tumblr started banning the things that made it unique from other sites and it too went wayside. Twitter is the next MySpace. It’ll hang around, but nobody uses it. On to the next thing
Maybe I’m old, but I miss Livejournal. I paid for my account, was happy to, but once our evil Russian overlords took over that was the end. I would never pay for Twitter. Elon can s*ck it.
@H a lot of people jumped ship when Strikethrough happened (you can google it if you like), but when the Russians bought it, it was even worse.
I’m sure someone’s pointed this out already, but Elon is targeting the bots and spam because those are the competitors: they’re getting free advertising on Twitter’s servers. But if Elon plugs all of the holes, some of those spammers might have to give him a cut of their revenue in order to be on your feed.
Also, I’m getting deja vu with the last time we were staring down a recession when an eccentric billionaire bought up a major source of news and information (2008) right before tanking most of the country’s important local news companies & controlling the narrative while his company profited from the sub prime mortgage scandal.
I’m not into finance or technology but my son, who is, said when Musk bought it that it likely had to do with wanting the proprietary software or something like that. Like I said, it’s not my thing so I was half following. But I could see musk just wanting something like that and, having gotten it, would be fine with eventually turning the shell of the company over to the banks.
Sure, this makes sense. The underlying technology can be valuable even if the initial way it’s used isn’t viable anymore.
Twitter, before Elin was unique, it managed to have varying peoples and ideas coexist, sometimes not smooth but has a reputation for reliable information, something unique to any right wing media company.
But it was not left wing.
Its asset was the people, many of which did not want to deal with antisocial behaviour.
That was the attraction for the advertising standards authority.
If it were the code, they could’ve paid some to create something similar but would never attract the eclectic mix of individuals not information.
That is the shame. Many of these people will not vote away their rights due to fair to let “smart?” undemocratic people, who want to rule change the metrics of democracy.
It couldn’t happen to a nicer jerk.
Prediction; by next month he will has sold Twitter to a Saudi Prince/businessman, or another dodgy billionaire.
I am unaware that the investors are dodgy, but they are indeed Saudis.
This is all part of the plan for him and his bro’s to launch another social media platform next year. (sometime around april-may)
Between the big fat cat corporations that are being affected and the legitimate concerns from the government, Elon AND his backers may be about to have an interesting time of it.
He basically did! And he gets to walk away after declaring bankruptcy.
People need to stop thinking Elon Musk is some kind of brilliant supervillain. He’s a failson who was born into apartheid jewels, bought things other people had built and proceeded to run them poorly, and was puffed up because our dumb society thinks rich = smart. I’ve known quite a few people who were born rich. Not a one of them had the good sense God gave a goose. The men are especially egregious.
Spot on.
This is like watching a train derail: difficult to watch, but you can’t take your eyes off it.
I feel bad for the Twitter employees and staff, but I will say that I ultimately think the collapse of the empire might actually be a good thing overall for the social media landscape. This could allow other services to start rising up, and that’ll bring fresh ideas in.