X -Where Twitter goes to die.

[RTH10260]

details on above

In Latest Round of Job Cuts, Twitter Is Said to Lay Off at Least 200 Employees
The social media platform now has a work force of less than 2,000, down from 7,500 when Elon Musk took it over in October.
Although the layoffs at Twitter occurred on Saturday night, the scope of the cuts did not become clear until Sunday.

By Kate Conger, Ryan Mac and Mike Isaac
Feb. 26, 2023

Twitter laid off at least 200 of its employees on Saturday night, three people familiar with the matter said, or about 10 percent of the roughly 2,000 who were still working for the company. Elon Musk, who acquired the social media platform in October, has steadily pared back its work force from about 7,500 employees as he has sought to reduce costs.

The layoffs came after a week when the company made it difficult for Twitter employees to communicate with each other. The company’s internal messaging service, Slack, was taken offline, preventing employees from chatting with each other or looking up company data, five current and former employees told The New York Times. On Saturday night, some employees discovered that they were logged out of their corporate email accounts and laptops, three of the people said — the first hint that layoffs had begun.

By Sunday morning, the scope of the cuts was becoming clear. Some Twitter employees used the platform to post farewell messages, while workers who had kept their jobs scrambled to use encrypted messaging services like Signal to determine who else was left. By Saturday night, the remaining employees had also lost access to a Google chat service associated with their work email accounts, three people said.

The cuts hit product managers, data scientists and engineers who worked on machine learning and site reliability, which helps keep Twitter’s various features online. The monetization infrastructure team, which maintains the services through which Twitter makes money, was reduced to fewer than eight people from 30, a person familiar with the matter said.

Among those affected by the layoffs were several founders of small tech companies that Twitter had acquired over the years, including Esther Crawford, who founded a screen-sharing and video chat app called Squad and recently oversaw Twitter’s effort to charge users for verification check marks, and Haraldur Thorleifsson, the creator of the design studio Ueno, which Twitter purchased in 2021. Several of the founders received higher compensation packages as part of the acquisitions of their companies, which could make it more expensive to lay them off as their stock and bonuses are paid out, three people familiar with the compensation packages said.



https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/26/tech ... yoffs.html

GUest link: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/26/tech ... =url-share

[RTH10260]

One could think that Elon Musk is closing down Twitter.

[tek]

The monetization infrastructure team, which maintains the services through which Twitter makes money, was reduced to fewer than eight people from 30, a person familiar with the matter said.

The man is BRILLIANT!

[Volkonski]

The monetization infrastructure team, which maintains the services through which Twitter makes money, was reduced to fewer than eight people from 30, a person familiar with the matter said.

The man is BRILLIANT!

Hey, Musk bought Twitter for a bargain price of 44 billion dollars. He doesn't need money.

[neonzx]

When it is finally closed up, I want to see video of him walking back out with his bathroom sink, alone. And without the $44 billion or whatever it was.

A man can dream.



What a freakshow.

[pipistrelle]

Who lays people off on a Saturday night?

[neonzx]

Who lays people off on a Saturday night?

Elon?

[Foggy]

Now he says the media is racist against white people and Asians.

In all my 70 years, I have never felt any racism toward me because I am white. I haven't lived in a bubble. I was on the PTA of a 90%+ black high school in this city for 4 years and never had a hint of racism. Maybe I didn't always fit in to mostly black events, but that also happened when a college buddy invited me to a wine tasting club at Georgetown with a lot of boring rich white geek people. There are some places I just don't belong.

But I go anyway.

And I mean, white privilege is a very real thing.

So when I see white people complaining about racism against white people, I just think, shut up you fucking whiner.

But now the (recently) richest man in the world - who came from South Africa, of all places - is whining about racism against white people. Oh, how he has suffered!

[Sam the Centipede]

But now the (recently) richest man in the world - who came from South Africa, of all places - is whining about racism against white people. Oh, how he has suffered!

Ya think Elmo's a fan of Dilbert?

[Foggy]

I think he's a racist asshole. I am enrage. I fart in his general direction.

[noblepa]

Now he says the media is racist against white people and Asians.

In all my 70 years, I have never felt any racism toward me because I am white. I haven't lived in a bubble. I was on the PTA of a 90%+ black high school in this city for 4 years and never had a hint of racism. Maybe I didn't always fit in to mostly black events, but that also happened when a college buddy invited me to a wine tasting club. There are some places I just don't belong.

But I go anyway.

And I mean, white privilege is a very real thing.

So when I see white people complaining about racism against white people, I just think, shut up you fucking whiner.

But now the (recently) richest man in the world - who came from South Africa, of all places - is whining about racism against white people. Oh, how he has suffered!

In my experience, when white people start complaining about reverse racism, directed at whites, it is almost always a case in which the playing field between whites and non-whites is being levelled, and they are losing the advantage that they have, simply by virtue of being white.

In other words, what they are experiencing is not racism, but the elimination of white hegemony.

"Give blacks and other non-whites an equal chance at a good job? Racism!!"

"Pay blacks and women the same as white men doing similar work? Racism and sexism!!

"I lost out on a job to a black man. Sure, he has a PhD and twenty years' experience in the field and I'm a high school dropout with a criminal record, but they only hired him because he's BLACK!!!"

I haven't heard it in a while, but I used to hear complaints from privileged white men that the NAACP was a racist organization, comparable to the klan. After all, it says it right there in their name, the National Association for the Advancement of COLORED People. Someone even formed the NAAWP. I don't know if it is still around or not.

Life is not a zero-sum game. Giving you a chance does not require taking away my chances.

[raison de arizona]

Elon Musk’s Twitter Lays Off Top Lieutenant in Charge of Twitter Blue

As Elon Musk has driven cost cuts even deeper into Twitter, he’s shown even the most loyal lieutenants aren’t immune from the scalpel.

Among those laid off in one of the biggest rounds of job cuts since Musk’s late October takeover was Esther Crawford, a product director at Twitter who rose to prominence early in Musk’s tenure and who had been in charge of Twitter’s relaunched subscription product. Twitter also laid off at least dozens of engineers, product managers, data scientists and managers over the weekend, according to people with direct knowledge.

The cuts suggest that Musk has failed to reverse a steep slide in revenue—down 40% year-over-year as of early January—that is styming his goal of making Twitter break even, particularly given the approximately $1.2 billion in annual interest payments the company owes related to Musk’s $44 billion leveraged buyout.

https://www.theinformation.com/articles ... itter-blue

[Foggy]

styming

... is not a word.

[Sam the Centipede]

In my experience, when white people start complaining about reverse racism, directed at whites, it is almost always a case in which the playing field between whites and non-whites is being levelled, and they are losing the advantage that they have, simply by virtue of being white.

Yes.

Recruitment is not my field but my impression is that the harshest this, ah, "anti-white racism" gets is shortlisting or interview procedures requiring that a sample of non-white and/or non-male candidates be included in the panel.

No guarantee of appointment. No guarantee that the interviewers won't reject on unspoken racist grounds. No preferential treatment.

Just the right to be seen and heard.

I have absolutely no problem with that.

[Volkonski]

I have been retired since mid-2010 but by then my employer was stressing to those of us involved in hiring the competitive advantage of recruiting qualified candidates regardless of race, gender, religion etc. Bigger hiring pool, better workforce.

[neonzx]

I have been retired since mid-2010 but by then my employer was stressing to those of us involved in hiring the competitive advantage of recruiting qualified candidates regardless of race, gender, religion etc. Bigger hiring pool, better workforce.

That seems like sound advice.

In practice, does it work? I've been accused of not seeing skin color gender or race or whatever. Guilty as charged.

Corporations exist to turn a profit. If they can replace an American worker with a H-2B holder for half the price, they will. Nothing to do with race -- just economics. I'm not advocating for that practice. It is just corporate greed.

[raison de arizona]

Esther Crawford slept on her office floor to deliver for her company but was still tossed out like dirty bath water. Don’t know who needs to hear this, but live for yourself and not any institution. Your job won’t ever love you.
Image

Just got confirmation that Esther Crawford, chief executive of Twitter Payments, is out.

[RTH10260]

Elon Musk’s Twitter Lays Off Top Lieutenant in Charge of Twitter Blue

As Elon Musk has driven cost cuts even deeper into Twitter, he’s shown even the most loyal lieutenants aren’t immune from the scalpel.

Among those laid off in one of the biggest rounds of job cuts since Musk’s late October takeover was Esther Crawford, a product director at Twitter who rose to prominence early in Musk’s tenure and who had been in charge of Twitter’s relaunched subscription product. Twitter also laid off at least dozens of engineers, product managers, data scientists and managers over the weekend, according to people with direct knowledge.

The cuts suggest that Musk has failed to reverse a steep slide in revenue—down 40% year-over-year as of early January—that is styming his goal of making Twitter break even, particularly given the approximately $1.2 billion in annual interest payments the company owes related to Musk’s $44 billion leveraged buyout.

https://www.theinformation.com/articles ... itter-blue

As was mentioned in the prior article Elon Musk dropped several high ranking / payed staff who got the job at Twitter with the takeover of their startups. the twitter-blue guy was one of them. Cost saving by cutting top brass who likely knew how Twitter works seems not a bright idea to me. The cost savings will be minimal in the overall picture.

[RTH10260]

https://twitter.com/ujuanya/status/1629928288519847936

Esther Crawford slept on her office floor to deliver for her company but was still tossed out like dirty bath water. Don’t know who needs to hear this, but live for yourself and not any institution. Your job won’t ever love you.

Just got confirmation that Esther Crawford, chief executive of Twitter Payments, is out.

Does this mean Twitter will be defaulting on payments soon? That vendors have lost their point of contact?

[Suranis]

Does this mean Twitter will be defaulting on payments soon? That vendors have lost their point of contact?

Not exactly. "Twitter Payments" was a product not a department, though I cant find exactly what it was. This is the closest to an explanation I could find on a quick search

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/202 ... port-says/

More engineers, product managers, and data scientists are out at Twitter, as another round of layoffs has slashed 10 percent of the remaining staff, The New York Times reported. Multiple sources familiar with the matter told the Times that 200 employees were affected.

On Saturday night—just as it happened during Twitter’s November layoffs—some employees discovered they were about to lose their jobs when they were abruptly logged out of corporate email accounts and laptops. Now there are fewer than 2,000 employees left, it’s estimated.

Among those impacted is Esther Crawford, who enthusiastically embraced Twitter CEO Elon Musk's vision of Twitter 2.0 and proved to be so hardcore that she became the chief executive of Twitter Payments, Financial Times reported. In November, Musk told staff there were no plans for more layoffs and pointed to Twitter Payments—a product that would support peer-to-peer payments and e-commerce on the platform—as the product that would save Twitter from going broke. Now, the Twitter Payments team has dropped from a staff of 30 to fewer than eight, the Times reported, making it unclear if the product is still a top priority as Twitter's money struggles drag on.

Ars could not immediately reach Twitter or Crawford for comment.

Crawford—who was once criticized for being a “bootlicker” by a former Twitter senior staff member—tweeted that she was “deeply proud of the team for building through so much noise and chaos.” She also said that “the worst take you could have from watching me go all-in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake.”

[Suranis]

Rereading that, I think Musk wanted to create a Paypal like service, so that you could do payments through Twitter. Not a terrible idea, but would never have plugged the hole in Twitter finances. Plus its a fairly crowded field.

[Gregg]

Rereading that, I think Musk wanted to create a Paypal like service, so that you could do payments through Twitter. Not a terrible idea, but would never have plugged the hole in Twitter finances. Plus its a fairly crowded field.

It was more like Venmo or CashApp than PayPal but yes, it was a way for you to pay people through Twitter.

Elmo is who he is because he was one of the founders of PayPal. While he was there, there was True Science Fact a person on the payroll whose main job was to keep Elmo distracted and away from doing anything stupid.

[neonzx]

I've slept on office floors during some time-sensitive crunch times, but not at the demand of superiors.

[neeneko]

In my experience, when white people start complaining about reverse racism, directed at whites, it is almost always a case in which the playing field between whites and non-whites is being levelled, and they are losing the advantage that they have, simply by virtue of being white.

In other words, what they are experiencing is not racism, but the elimination of white hegemony.

"Give blacks and other non-whites an equal chance at a good job? Racism!!"

"Pay blacks and women the same as white men doing similar work? Racism and sexism!!

Well, these are generally people who believe women and POC are inferior, thus unequal treatment is natural and correct, and equal treatment is holding back superior people.

[RTH10260]

H/T to the Mouse!