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Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

techcrunch.com

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Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#121

Post by photomatt »

mtlynch wrote: post #35

> So we decided to design the most generous buy-out package possible, we called it an Alignment Offer: if you resigned before 20:00 UTC on Thursday, October 3, 2024, you would receive $30,000 or six months of salary, whichever is higher. But you’d lose access to Automattic that evening, and you wouldn’t be eligible to boomerang (what we call re-hires). HR added some extra details to sweeten the deal; we wanted to mak…

It was posted on September 30 ~10pm UTC, so people had about 4 days to decide.

Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#122

Post by lupusreal »

cpach wrote: post #45
Sammi wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

159 left and they are 8.4% of the workforce according to the article. 159 is 8.4% of X Equation: Y = P% of X Solving our equation for X X = Y/P% X = 159/8.4% Converting percent to decimal: X = 159/8.4\* 100 X = 1892.85714

So we can know for sure that those who stay think that the CEO made a good decision in this regard, simply because they declined this offer?

People who take their job personally tend to assume other people do too. Basic psychological projection. The CEO is probably doing this too.

A lot of people just view their job as a thing they do for the compensation. Taking the offer or not is about the opportunities and struggles they'll be facing either way, not their personal feelings about the company.

Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#123

Post by photomatt »

mtlynch wrote: post #35

> So we decided to design the most generous buy-out package possible, we called it an Alignment Offer: if you resigned before 20:00 UTC on Thursday, October 3, 2024, you would receive $30,000 or six months of salary, whichever is higher. But you’d lose access to Automattic that evening, and you wouldn’t be eligible to boomerang (what we call re-hires). HR added some extra details to sweeten the deal; we wanted to mak…

This was more generous than both the Basecamp and Coinbase buyout offers, I'm curious why you say I'm a petty tyrant. I can be a little ASD so sometimes my written communication doesn't come through the best.

Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#124

Post by jeroenhd »

CaptainFever wrote: post #73
fire_lake wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Twitter was profitable just before Elon purchased it and gutted it. So far his plan is not working.

I was curious if this is true or not. Found this: https://www.investing.com/academy/statistics/twitter-facts-s... which came from before Twitter went private. It's technically correct that they did make a profit (e.g. 2022 Q1), but also made a lot of loss (e.g. 2022 Q2). Comparatively, it's hard to find information about Twitter now. Most news articles mocks the revenue, but has no information about profit. However,…

The massive debt Elon has set Twitter up with is probably driving their current losses. Advertisers wanting nothing to do with him after telling them to fuck off is one thing, but the interest on those billions of borrowed money aren't cheap to hold on to.

What also doesn't help Twitter's case is that employees are still fighting to get paid their severance fees. That's a couple hundred million dollars that Elon probably assumes he doesn't need to pay. Other fees on the order of tens of millions of dollars also include the rent that Elon decided he doesn't need to pay, as well as a bunch of other bunch of unpaid stuff.

My guess is that Twitter is banking on not having to pay all of its debts at once, slowly building up a profit and regaining its value so it can have the cashflow to pay back its arrears later, but that's a risky move that may lead to a debt spiral or bankruptcy.

Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#126

Post by jart »

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #56
user90131313 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

twitter fired a lot more % and it's still working

It is actually quite remarkable that Twitter has kept functioning at a technical level. A lot of people expected the massive loss of engineering talent to doom them, but it seemingly hasn't. However, the site is going through a serious cultural (maybe you could say spiritual) death, and that might have something to do with the lost institutional knowledge of what made Twitter tick at a level deeper than just the code…

When SWEs in tech want to flex, they code Twitter on a whiteboard as an interview question. Major respect for the the work they're doing at xAI, but the hardest challenges building Twitter itself are social.

Re: Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer

#129

Post by nottorp »

kelnos wrote: post #62
TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is actually quite remarkable that Twitter has kept functioning at a technical level. A lot of people expected the massive loss of engineering talent to doom them, but it seemingly hasn't. However, the site is going through a serious cultural (maybe you could say spiritual) death, and that might have something to do with the lost institutional knowledge of what made Twitter tick at a level deeper than just the code…

I'm skeptical, honestly. Within the first few months of the acquisition, it seemed pretty clear to my tech-friend group that Twitter was on its way out and was going to fail. But it's been 2 years, and many of those same people still use Twitter quite a lot. Maybe it'll still fail, of course... it'll just take longer than anyone expected. I was never a big fan of it, and never used it much, so I can't judge any loss…

My friends who were passing around twitter links still seem to do it. And the content of those links hasn't changed (random nature/technical info that geeks like) so the twitter posters haven't left either.

The only thing that changes is i used to click on those that looked interesting and now i don't because i know i won't see the thread without a login.

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