Twitter has fired more software engineers(twitter.com)
twitter.com
Twitter has fired more software engineers
https://twitter.com/gergelyorosz/status/1595684664228052992
371 comments
I heard the FSD code was a chaotic disaster too. I think numerous inexperienced programmers find fault with other people’s code and sometimes those criticisms are valid, but more often there is a huge amount of context the person sitting in their ivory tower is unaware of.
Doing things like this with kindness and wisdom would be better than swinging the axe with incomplete information. Especially H1Bs who are reliant on an employer to remain in the country are hopefully exempt from such extreme punishment and are at least given a shot at doing what Musk wants in terms of code quality.
From my point of view there’s no need to treat people as disposable commodities who cannot improve given the right environment. And I don’t like anyone thinking their opinions are that much better than anyone else’s, but these are the times we live in…
Doing things like this with kindness and wisdom would be better than swinging the axe with incomplete information. Especially H1Bs who are reliant on an employer to remain in the country are hopefully exempt from such extreme punishment and are at least given a shot at doing what Musk wants in terms of code quality.
From my point of view there’s no need to treat people as disposable commodities who cannot improve given the right environment. And I don’t like anyone thinking their opinions are that much better than anyone else’s, but these are the times we live in…
All I can do is express my sympathy to those affected. None of you deserved to be treated like this.
With 33% of the severance that the 'non-clickers' got just last week too.
Why would anyone re-join Twitter2 or get hired there?
Why are the people that got put on the PIP doing anything but trying to find another job?
You know Elon's just going to abuse you and not much else, he's proven it a few times now. It's very clear, he thinks you're a chump and he's going to keep treating you like a chump.
Why would anyone re-join Twitter2 or get hired there?
Why are the people that got put on the PIP doing anything but trying to find another job?
You know Elon's just going to abuse you and not much else, he's proven it a few times now. It's very clear, he thinks you're a chump and he's going to keep treating you like a chump.
None of this is surprising. It's not about the code it's about figuring out a reason to fire people to cut costs dramatically since the company isn't profitable at its current footprint or with its current Chief Moron making it a toxic asset for advertisers.
> Those fired got 4 weeks severance, by the way. A slap in the face, given that if they chose to not click "yes" to stay just a week ago, they would have gotten 3 months.
Can this be real? That’s seriously f-ed up.
Can this be real? That’s seriously f-ed up.
Who is judging the code not being satisfactory? Can we see example of the code in question? Can we also see examples of the code written by those who say other folk's code isn't satisfactory? In other words, are the evaluators even competent? Usually not.
Too bad the Mars colonization effort is just another Musk PR scam. It would have been great to eventually see that guy leave this planet and hopefully never return.
I once worked at a very high-end online fashion retailer, and as a programmer, it was a decent place to work, and I look back fondly on my time there.
However, if you were in the fashion industry, and especially if you wanted to work at a company founded by an inspiring woman, it was absolutely the place you wanted to work. HR were inundated by applications for non-tech positions by highly capable and motivated people, and HR acted like it. It was very selective, and the best people fought for jobs there and worked hard.
But for tech workers, it was simply an decent place to work, and was perpetually a little bit short-staffed. HR couldn't wrap their minds around the fact that this one segment had choices and weren't really that fussed about working there, and so it took a lot of work for engineering managers to free up basic recruitment marketing money, to streamline recruitment processes etc.
I wonder if there's some of that going on. For people who want to work on the cutting edge of space-tech, SpaceX has to be very high up on the list of places you'd want to work. For people who want to build electric cars, ditto Tesla.
But for software engineers who are good enough to do the work that needs to be done at Twitter? meh, there are choices. There are companies with much more interesting problems, companies with larger scale, companies who'll pay better. Are there that many Twitter True Believers? My understanding is the big draw beforehand for Twitter was that they had a great working environment, and that's evaporated.
I wonder if Musk will be able to get his head around that.
However, if you were in the fashion industry, and especially if you wanted to work at a company founded by an inspiring woman, it was absolutely the place you wanted to work. HR were inundated by applications for non-tech positions by highly capable and motivated people, and HR acted like it. It was very selective, and the best people fought for jobs there and worked hard.
But for tech workers, it was simply an decent place to work, and was perpetually a little bit short-staffed. HR couldn't wrap their minds around the fact that this one segment had choices and weren't really that fussed about working there, and so it took a lot of work for engineering managers to free up basic recruitment marketing money, to streamline recruitment processes etc.
I wonder if there's some of that going on. For people who want to work on the cutting edge of space-tech, SpaceX has to be very high up on the list of places you'd want to work. For people who want to build electric cars, ditto Tesla.
But for software engineers who are good enough to do the work that needs to be done at Twitter? meh, there are choices. There are companies with much more interesting problems, companies with larger scale, companies who'll pay better. Are there that many Twitter True Believers? My understanding is the big draw beforehand for Twitter was that they had a great working environment, and that's evaporated.
I wonder if Musk will be able to get his head around that.
How do you make that kind of determination when you're missing the wider context which led to the code being written? Same goes for the code printouts and screenshots he was requesting people send.
Did Elon write any code during his time at PayPal?
Did Elon write any code during his time at PayPal?
A lot of people who stayed did so because of H1Bs, and a lot of those people were sacked last night. Imagine having to find a new job in 60 days, starting the night before Thanksgiving. My heart goes out to those poor folks.
If I were to guess what's going on, it is that Elon Musk is seeing losses and not profits.
He now owns a significant chunk of the firm (not quite 100%, there were some other buyers, etc. but close enough). So now every $1 expensed by the loss-making company, he sees as a dollar he personally loses - and that's after overpaying through the nose for the company (he got hit by a double-whammy: Twitter value crashed along with other Tech stocks, and he had to sell more Tesla stock to cover the over-inflated valuation).
This is quite different from the perspective of a, say, 5% owner. For every dollar spent by the firm, that's only a $0.05 "spend" out of the minority stake owner. It's easier to justify such expenses to yourself, emotionally.
Basically, the more of your personal wealth is locked into an enterprise, the more risk-averse you become about it. If you have a diversified portfolio of small stakes, you're more likely to be bullish on them individually and encourage investment for high-risk / high-reward profile, but not if you basically have one massive bet.
So I'm guessing, he's thinking he not only overpaid for Twitter, he is now paying through the nose just to keep the office open, and he's not clear what it's all for. So without an idea for profits, he is desperate to cut the losses.
Obviously the human cost - collateral damage to Musk - is tremendous and it makes me so sad to see people's livelihoods shattered on a whim like this.
He now owns a significant chunk of the firm (not quite 100%, there were some other buyers, etc. but close enough). So now every $1 expensed by the loss-making company, he sees as a dollar he personally loses - and that's after overpaying through the nose for the company (he got hit by a double-whammy: Twitter value crashed along with other Tech stocks, and he had to sell more Tesla stock to cover the over-inflated valuation).
This is quite different from the perspective of a, say, 5% owner. For every dollar spent by the firm, that's only a $0.05 "spend" out of the minority stake owner. It's easier to justify such expenses to yourself, emotionally.
Basically, the more of your personal wealth is locked into an enterprise, the more risk-averse you become about it. If you have a diversified portfolio of small stakes, you're more likely to be bullish on them individually and encourage investment for high-risk / high-reward profile, but not if you basically have one massive bet.
So I'm guessing, he's thinking he not only overpaid for Twitter, he is now paying through the nose just to keep the office open, and he's not clear what it's all for. So without an idea for profits, he is desperate to cut the losses.
Obviously the human cost - collateral damage to Musk - is tremendous and it makes me so sad to see people's livelihoods shattered on a whim like this.
Ouch. The timing is really rough for H1B visa holders. With Thanksgiving and then the end of year holidays coming up, it effectively burns half the 60 day period to find a new job. That’s brutal.
The absolute cruelty of Musk through this whole process is astounding.
One has to assume he's like this at his other companies as well, which is absolutely shredding their reputation in my eyes.
One has to assume he's like this at his other companies as well, which is absolutely shredding their reputation in my eyes.
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Twitter has fired more software engineers (twitter.com/gergelyorosz)
139 points by r721 3 hours ago | flag | hide | 242 commentsTwitter is not working anymore. I got errors after errors. My timeline won't load on mobile at least four times over five. I don't get most of my notifications on the website even when the interaction are right there before my eyes.
It is quite amazing/awful to me how it is possible to break a platform that has been working pretty well for 15 years in a matters of weeks. This is quite fast.
Anyway, most of all I sincerely hope the layed-off people will find another, better job as quickly as they were fired.
It is quite amazing/awful to me how it is possible to break a platform that has been working pretty well for 15 years in a matters of weeks. This is quite fast.
Anyway, most of all I sincerely hope the layed-off people will find another, better job as quickly as they were fired.
I’m not well versed in California/USA labour laws but does the haste and lack of cause for firings seem like grounds for civil suits?
To be fair to Musk, indeed he is delivering on the "hardcore" twitter promise. Edit: not condoning his practices.
“How much do twitter devs have to take?” - before a union vote, I hope?
Related discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33733843
At this point Musk seems to be doing things just for attention and losing least money with Twitter.
Who are these people who are clicking yes to longer hours except for H1B visa holders who would have to leave the country if they don’t find a job in 60 days?
On another note, in any major city in the US, a software developer is making above the local average income and has no reason to not have a “go to hell fund”.
On another note, in any major city in the US, a software developer is making above the local average income and has no reason to not have a “go to hell fund”.
Does anyone think these decisions are best for Twitter at this time?
Unhinged tweeting at odd hours, erratic decisions, irritability, lack of sleep, extreme defensiveness, vengefulness ("let's shame the advertisers"!), demands for unquestioned loyalty. Where have we seen this before?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/16/business/elon-musk-interv...
"But this has worried some board members, who have noted that sometimes the drug [Ambien] does not put Mr. Musk to sleep but instead contributes to late-night Twitter sessions, according to a person familiar with the board’s thinking."
This man is a walking zombie on no sleep. I just wonder if he is naturally this wired or he is crashing on upper/downer pills, like Trump did.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/16/business/elon-musk-interv...
"But this has worried some board members, who have noted that sometimes the drug [Ambien] does not put Mr. Musk to sleep but instead contributes to late-night Twitter sessions, according to a person familiar with the board’s thinking."
This man is a walking zombie on no sleep. I just wonder if he is naturally this wired or he is crashing on upper/downer pills, like Trump did.
This should serve as a warning to everybody working at any of Musk's companies. Musk is unstable and unpredictable. You can't afford to put your career in his hands. The time to leave is now.
Time to unionize.
How many engineers did Instagram have when it was acquired by FB? (answer: 6 engineers with 30 million users: https://www.fastcompany.com/3047642/do-the-simple-thing-firs...)
Obviously, those were highly competent engineers, but perhaps Elon Musk is just trying to get to roughly the same proportion (~60?).
If so, he's still got a long, long way to go, so expect a lot more cutting.
Obviously, those were highly competent engineers, but perhaps Elon Musk is just trying to get to roughly the same proportion (~60?).
If so, he's still got a long, long way to go, so expect a lot more cutting.
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Sorry for going so off topic, down vote if you think it's too far. But:
Does anyone else think he's gearing up for running as president for the Republicans at one point in the future? I'm not a US citizen so I just have my armchair criticism to go on, but it's the most rational explanation of his behaviour I can come up with. Haven't read this from anyone else so far though. If Trump can do it, why not him?
Edit: Thanks for clarifying! So I guess that doesn't make sense.
Does anyone else think he's gearing up for running as president for the Republicans at one point in the future? I'm not a US citizen so I just have my armchair criticism to go on, but it's the most rational explanation of his behaviour I can come up with. Haven't read this from anyone else so far though. If Trump can do it, why not him?
Edit: Thanks for clarifying! So I guess that doesn't make sense.
I’ve met many more “witch-hunt” reviews that were just a reason to thin the company to please VC or shareholders.
The article/tweet doesn’t mention it, but I assume they have the same severance package of a few months as the rest. If so, it could be a lot worse