Twitter Set For More Layoffs As Musk Mulls Next Move

Twitter CEO Elon Musk is considering more layoffs – including sales and commercial partnerships – as whoever remains following an exodus of software engineers enjoyed a "hardcore" weekend helping the tech industry veteran in a "code review" of the social media platform.

Reports suggest roles in sales, partnerships, and similar were now under threat in a cull which has seen the majority of staff leave the company. On Friday, Musk called in leaders of the sales and business teams and asked them to fire more people, according to Bloomberg.

The news outlet claimed marketing and sales leader Robin Wheeler and head of partnerships Maggie Suniewick were fired by Musk after they refused to comply with his request. Earlier Wheeler had decided to resign but was convinced to stay.

On Wednesday, Musk told a Delaware court his reorganization of Twitter was almost complete as the transition team made up of venture capitalists David Sacks, Jason Calacanis, and Sriram Krishnan took a step back.

Meanwhile, the software engineering team, or what remains of it, has had a busy Friday night.

According to one of Musk's tweets, published Saturday morning, the team had just conducted a "code review" complete with an architectural diagram of the platform.

The late-night session followed an ultimatum from Musk which required staff to affirm they would endure an "extremely hardcore" working environment by 5pm Eastern time Thursday. Those who did not sign up were told they would have to leave the company and collect three months' severance pay. However, the legal standing of the approach has been called into question.

Musk's "hardcore" move was followed by an exodus of senior software engineers, which followed the ones fired since he joined the company. They include principal software engineer Yao Yue, software engineer Sasha Solomon, and backend engineer Nick Morgan.

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Earlier last week, another software engineer, Eric Frohnhoefer, was fired following his criticism of Musk's claim that the Twitter app "is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs just to render a home timeline!"

Musk's more recent architecture photo clearly shows "remote procedure calls" several steps removed from the app.

As some question Twitter's medium-term technical viability, Musk continues to tweet memes of a cryptic biblical nature and questionable sexual overtones.

Other moves from the divisive CEO include conducting an online poll on the reinstatement of twice-impeached former US president Donald Trump, who had been removed from the platform following perceived incitement of political violence in the run-up to the January 6 Capitol attack, for which Trump is still under investigation. Trump has yet to take up the offer.

To cap an eventful week, Musk has been gifted a "monument" representing a four-legged effigy of himself riding a rocket. Apparently intended to signify GOAT (Greatest of All Time), the statue looks more like Musk's head stuck on a poor interpretation of the Very Hungry Caterpillar. Quite why a group of crypto enthusiasts decided to build the $600,000 monstrosity remains unclear, but it does mark the fact that just when the world seems like it could not get weirder, it does. ®