Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#441

Post by papito » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 10:34 AM UTC

prox wrote: post #197

jcranmer wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming that someone leaving immediately causes things to break down. A lot of things will take some time to see the effects of people leaving. Fire your entire payroll department. No one will notice... until the biweekly paychecks don't go out, and now your employees aren't getting paid. Fire badge security. No one will notice... until you need someone to make a new badge for a new employee. Fire your IT sta…

And knowledge drain? I mean the codebase must be substantial?

I mean, try hiring Scala engineers on a good day, and especially those who are willing to deal with this crap.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#442

Post by solarkraft » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 11:54 AM UTC

snapplebobapple wrote: post #411

rem7 wrote: post #109

In my opinion Elon miscalculated the type of people at Twitter. These aren’t people like the ones in Tesla or SpaceX where there is some sort of idealization of Elon. The number of fan boys he has at Twitter must be super low. None of the Twitter employees signed up to work for him, it’s pretty obvious from the public tweets that most of the staff has posted that they don’t have much respect for him. On top of that,…

I disagree. I think he exactly calculated the kind of people at twitter, which is why he's trying so hard to get as many of them as possible to quit. He wants to make money off this purchase and to do that he needs to dramatically increase employee productivity, reduce headcounts to bare minimums to keep the current system running and then innovate something more on top of it to really make money. Work life balance p…

That does sound like a plan that could work (other comments have hinted at why it may not on this case).

But firing everyone immediately, with no chance to transfer knowledge? Funny!

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#443

Post by c-cube » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 12:36 PM UTC

bioemerl wrote: post #246

rem7 wrote: post #109

In my opinion Elon miscalculated the type of people at Twitter. These aren’t people like the ones in Tesla or SpaceX where there is some sort of idealization of Elon. The number of fan boys he has at Twitter must be super low. None of the Twitter employees signed up to work for him, it’s pretty obvious from the public tweets that most of the staff has posted that they don’t have much respect for him. On top of that,…

On the contrary, I think Elon knows the type of person at Twitter and is getting rid of them as fast as possible, the only bad side being that he doesn't (maybe) realize the harm that will do when the knowledge of the systems walks out the door.

He hasn't had time to know them. He doesn't even know who does what and who's already been fired. It's only been a few weeks. He's only now wanting to "understand the tech stack"!

He might think he knows the employees, based on his prejudices and clichés. Nothing more.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#444

Post by quonn » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 2:20 PM UTC

memish wrote: post #71

JohnTHaller wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

80hr+ in-office work weeks with no equity and the threat of being instantly fired for appearing disloyal in Slack or correcting the CEO... sounds fun!

They don't have stock? Also maybe don't say your employer is a "petulant man child" in Slack or otherwise undermine them and you'll be fine. The idea that an employer should keep people that actively dislike like him or her is insane.

In many countries it would be illegal for the CEO of a large company to fire you for merely disliking them.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#445

Post by seba_dos1 » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 3:43 PM UTC

d0mine wrote: post #422

lancesells wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An addicted twitter toll with 100m followers starts talking shit about the place you work, purchases a lot of shares, decides to join the board, decides to not join the board, talks more shit, decides to just buy the company, changes his mind and backs out of the deal, talks more shit, changes his mind and buys the company, introduces new features without much thought, releases new features without much thought, turn…

It is representative of how he is shown on HN. Judging by other things discussed on HN that I do understand well, it is likely highly inaccurate picture. It reminds me of Knoll’s law of media accuracy: “everything you read in the newspapers is absolutely true, except for the rare story of which you happen to have firsthand knowledge” and especially The Gell-Mann amnesia effect https://effectiviology.com/knolls-law/#T…

This was just a description of independently observable facts. It even matches the timeline of the events. If anything, it may be missing a few items - it didn't even mention the court case at all.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#446

Post by snapplebobapple » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 3:52 PM UTC

solarkraft wrote: post #442

snapplebobapple wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. I think he exactly calculated the kind of people at twitter, which is why he's trying so hard to get as many of them as possible to quit. He wants to make money off this purchase and to do that he needs to dramatically increase employee productivity, reduce headcounts to bare minimums to keep the current system running and then innovate something more on top of it to really make money. Work life balance p…

That does sound like a plan that could work (other comments have hinted at why it may not on this case). But firing everyone immediately , with no chance to transfer knowledge? Funny!

In a situation you have to make choices as to what is important and, I don't think transferring knowledge is as important as everyone thinks in this case. The users don't directly make twitter money so there's no direct losses from downtime, plus advertisers are being scared away so the indirect losses from downtime from not being able to show ads is also minimized at the moment. The biggest cost is tipping the exodus numbers so far that what is left of twitter loses it's network effects to attract new users onces the next version is launched and the exodus is really far from that level right now. So, what's the expected value of a 12-48 hour outage on the small chance that something totally breaks and it takes your team of really smart people that long to figure it out without the knowledge transfer? I would say it's pretty small. On the other hand what is the benefit of using a decent chunk of the remaining six billion in cash in the company to pay off and push out all the people that will work life balance the plan into not working (and the smaller subset of wokes that will actively sabotage it)? I would say pretty high, given what the plan apparently is. There is also a time value to getting this done because the faster they do it the faster it can fade from collective consciousness and the faster things die down enough for Elon to step back from the CEO role, put a kinder, gentler but competent face in that role, rebuild advertiser relationships and make this thing print money.

I know if I was in his position I would be trying to fire more people than I actually think I need to right now just to make sure I don't have to prolong the bad press with later layoffs and to ensure there are roles to fill in three to six months when I get a full handle on the business and know what I actually need. This would accomplish both generating good press and ensure I can fill positions with people aligned with my vision and work ethic.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#447

Post by kenjackson » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 3:54 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #426

mustacheemperor wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>head over to r/conservatives and see what the discussion is like. They will welcome progressives and disagreeing views This is absolutely untrue. I generally do not engage in political discussion on hackernews so politics entirely aside, from a reddit content moderation standpoint this is just a falsehood. It is one of the most tightly moderated subreddits on the website and users are banned rapidly and constantly f…

> absolute fabrication So you're accusing me of making it up? malice? I am just stating what I've experienced for over a year of browsing and participating on r/conservative. Instead of trusting me or you, I'll just leave the link here for people to decide: https://www.reddit.com/r/conservative And to add to the accusation, I've found the opposite on Reddit and HN. Stating conservative opinions are not welcomed at al…

What’s an example conservative opinion? That we should reduce taxes? Or that white males are the most oppressed? Or both?

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#448

Post by meepmorp » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 4:04 PM UTC

d0mine wrote: post #423

themitigating wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amphetamine addiction can cause impulsive behavior and allow a person to work abnormal hours

Cocaine addict may be behind long hours for medical doctors: "Fledgling residents had to suffer long, consecutive work shifts, day and night. To Halsted, sleep was a dispensable luxury that detracted from the ability to work and learn. Halsted’s mentality was difficult to argue with, since he himself practiced what he preached, being renowned for a seemingly superhuman ability to stay awake for apparently days on end…

Thanks, that article was wild.

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#449

Post by themitigating » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 9:03 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #403

kenjackson wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Rationality and reason seems to have shifted from liberals to conservatives. We can't even say biological facts. Many others are leaving the woke non-sense," Isn't it the Republicans that are still saying homosexuality is a choice? Aren't they the ones aligned with QAnon woke-conspiracies? Aren't they ones that pushed that Obama was born in Africa? What biological facts do Democrats say you can't say? At worst, Dems…

I know how crooked some of the Republicans are and some of the conspiracy shit that's going around. But, it's not like Democrats are clean, this is what is cooking in the progressive circles, especially in colleges and academia: https://twitter.com/LPofDelaware/status/1583078489430798336 What would be helpful is if you try to, with good faith, head over to r/conservatives and see what the discussion is like. They wil…

You're comparing liberal people who vote democrat to republican politicians.

The people who create the laws have the power. What laws they create and their policies is what matters. They are also voted in, meaning people support their views.

Anyone can just say ,"I'm a Democrat and all kittens should be killed" hell, someone could lie to make a particular side look bad. However a person who has support behind them, like a politician, pundits, etc, those people matter and define what represents a political ideology.

For example Biden doesn't support defunding the police nor has that happened I believe anywhere (there might be 1 or 2 exceptions). Republicans, by that I mean politicans, on the other hand have enacted their views into law

What laws have the Democrats pushed or enacted for woke ideology?

Re: Twitter in chaos as employees accept Musk’s invitation to quit their jobs

#450

Post by themitigating » Sat, Nov 19, 2022, 9:07 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #426

mustacheemperor wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>head over to r/conservatives and see what the discussion is like. They will welcome progressives and disagreeing views This is absolutely untrue. I generally do not engage in political discussion on hackernews so politics entirely aside, from a reddit content moderation standpoint this is just a falsehood. It is one of the most tightly moderated subreddits on the website and users are banned rapidly and constantly f…

> absolute fabrication So you're accusing me of making it up? malice? I am just stating what I've experienced for over a year of browsing and participating on r/conservative. Instead of trusting me or you, I'll just leave the link here for people to decide: https://www.reddit.com/r/conservative And to add to the accusation, I've found the opposite on Reddit and HN. Stating conservative opinions are not welcomed at al…

R/conservative has moderators who ban people, on Hackernews you're referring to getting downvoted which is done by users.