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☆ I Was Attacked by Donald Trump and Elon Musk. I Believe It Was a Strategy To Change What You See Online. - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-18 | by ( Yoel Roth | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

The timing of the campaign targeting me and my alleged bias suggested the attacks were part of a well-planned strategy. But the success of a strategy aimed at forcing social media companies to reconsider their choices may not require demonstrating actual wrongdoing. What happened to me was part of a calculated effort to make Twitter reluctant to moderate Mr. Trump in the future and to dissuade other companies from taking similar steps. of Twitter, overruled Trust and Safety’s recommendation that Mr. Trump’s account should be banned because of several tweets, including one that attacked Vice President Mike Pence. So Twitter only disclosed the campaign over a year later, without fingering the Indian government as the perpetrator.

Persons: Rich Bond, Trump, Jack Dorsey, Mike Pence, Marjorie Taylor Greene, —, Vladimir Putin Organizations: Republican, Capitol, Twitter, Apple, Google Locations: Silicon, TikTok, India, Moscow

But it was justified in Musk’s mind because of his conviction that Twitter’s management had misled him. At 4:12 p.m. Pacific time, once they had confirmation that the money had transferred, Musk pulled the trigger to close the deal. But when his Twitter email was cut off, it took him a few minutes to get the document into a Gmail message. Hybrid work is winningChief executives aren’t letting up on their push to get workers back to the office. And even Zoom, a symbol of remote work, has ordered some of its employees to work in the office.

Persons: Twitter Elon Musk’s, Wall, Walter Isaacson, Isaacson, “, ”, Musk, Agrawal, Andy Jassy, Amazon’s, “ It’s, Organizations: Elon, Twitter Elon, Twitter, Wall Street, Mr, Meta, Labor Locations: ”

☆ Twitter’s rebrand is the next stage in Elon Musk’s vision for the company. But does anyone want it?
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-25 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

When Musk bought Twitter late last year, he laid out a vision for an “everything” app called X, where users could communicate, shop, consume entertainment and more. Musk — who bought Twitter with a company called X Corp. — tweeted on Sunday that X.com now redirects to Twitter. Musk even told followers that tweets should instead be called “x’s.”On Sunday, CEO Linda Yaccarino seemed to confirm Musk’s vision for the company. Elon Musk has officially rebranded Twitter as "X," as he seeks to turn the platform into an "everything" app. And until Musk rolls out significant changes to the platform, observers of the company say ditching Twitter’s well-known brand is a risky move.

Persons: New York CNN — Elon Musk’s, Musk, — Musk, “, —, It’s, ” Mike Proulx, Forrester, Proulx, ”, Linda Yaccarino, ” Yaccarino, Elon Musk, Jonathan Brady, Walter Isaacson, texted Isaacson, ” “, ” Musk, he’s, WeChat, Deloitte, Instagram, Joshua White Organizations: New, New York CNN, Twitter, PayPal, Musk —, X Corp, SpaceX, Facebook, Vanderbilt University Locations: New York, China, Arizona, Michigan

☆ Lordstown Motors, an Electric Truck Maker, Files for Bankruptcy
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-27 | by ( Neal E. Boudette | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Lordstown Motors, the troubled electric pickup truck company that bought a shuttered General Motors factory in Ohio, filed for bankruptcy protection on Tuesday. Foxconn said Lordstown had breached their investment agreement because its stock had fallen below $1 a share. Lordstown said on Tuesday it had filed a lawsuit asserting that Foxconn failed to honor its agreement to invest more money into the company. Lordstown was founded in 2018 by Steve Burns, the former chief executive of another electric vehicle company called Workhorse Group. plant in Lordstown, Ohio, that had produced the Chevrolet Cruze sedan.

Persons: Donald J, Foxconn, Lordstown, Steve Burns, Trump Organizations: Motors, General Motors, Trump, Chevrolet, Twitter Locations: Ohio, Taiwan, Lordstown , Ohio

And so whenever I get one of those notifications, I know I’m going to have a good time there. kevin roose[LAUGHS]: I actually don’t think I could’ve told you what IBM stood for. kevin rooseSo I’ve thought a lot and written a lot about how and when AI actually is a threat to jobs. The third category is just the jobs that I think are going to be protected, the jobs that we won’t let AI do. But I don’t actually think the speed of it matters at all.

SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON, May 4 (Reuters) - A Miami-based digital marketing firm was behind a series of covert political influence operations in Latin America over the last year, Facebook-owner Meta (META.O) said this week, a rare exposé of an apparent U.S.-based misinformation-for-hire outfit. "It's a classic pattern that you tend to see with for-hire influence operations," said Ben Nimmo, Meta's Global Threat Intelligence Lead. Meta says it regularly takes down disinformation and misinformation operations in order to maintain the integrity of its platform. Twitter said in a September 2022 blog that it had shared datasets about influence operations with Cazadores. Former Twitter employees told Reuters in January that most of the staff involved in the TMRC had since left and Reuters could not determine if it was still operational.

☆ EU was set to ban internal combustion engine cars. Then Germany suddenly changed its mind
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-24 | by ( Ivana Kottasová | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —When EU lawmakers voted to ban the sale of new combustion engine cars in the bloc by 2035, it was a landmark victory for climate. With cars and vans responsible for around 15% of its total greenhouse gas emissions, a phase-out of polluting vehicles is a key part of EU climate policy. The law envisions a total ban on the sale of new diesel and gasoline cars by 2035. Germany is now pushing against the idea that all internal combustion engines must be banned. Other European countries, including Italy, Poland and the Czech Republic, have joined Germany in demanding the exception.

☆ Elon Musk is behaving 'like the local drunk,' says a former Twitter executive
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A former Twitter exec told i News that Elon Musk was behaving "like the local drunk." "The more Musk behaves like the local drunk – getting into slanging matches with disabled ex-employees – the less current employees will be proud to say they work there," Daisley told i News. Just a week after taking control of Twitter, Musk laid off around half of its workers. "It's a little bit like the character in the cartoon who runs off the cliff but doesn't fall straight away," Daisley told i News. Under Musk, Twitter has become "a pressure cooker," an employee who still works at the company and who spoke on the condition of anonymity told i News.

☆ The generative AI boom is bringing San Francisco’s tech scene roaring back to life
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-31 | by ( Diamond Naga Siu | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Techies fled from San Francisco during the pandemic, and its resurgence stalled for a while. It's just south of Japantown, mere blocks from San Francisco City Hall, and north of the Mission District. Someone even said it would be "irresponsible" to not work on generative AI in San Francisco. There aren't any skeptics in the space yet, and the majority of generative AI investments land in the Bay Area. Email dsiu@insider.com or tweet @diamondnagasiu) Edited by Matt Weinberger (tweet @gamoid) in San Francisco and Hallam Bullock (tweet @hallam_bullock) in London.

☆ Pitch Decks That Advertising Tech Startups Used to Raise Millions
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-10 | by ( Business Insider | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +19 min

Check out these pitch decks that they've used to sell their vision and raise millions from private equity and VC investors. Blocking ad fraudAdtech startup Lunio, announced a $15 million Series A funding round in September 2022. In May 2022, the software-as-a-service startup raised a $30 million Series B round, led by Insight Partners. Marketing in the metaverseAnima, an augmented-reality startup, raised a $3 million funding round from investors in Janury. He raised $50 million in Series D after closing a $34 million Series C last year, bringing its total raised to $100 million.

☆ Big Tech predictions for 2023: A rival for Twitter, Amazon deceleration, Google's AI wake-up call, Microsoft's serious game, cloud bills, and DTC decline
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-28 | by ( Hugh Langley | Kali Hays | Ashley Stewart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

The painful adjustments will ripple across the industry in 2023.Insider's Big Tech reporters share what to watch this coming year. At $44 billion, the debt-fueled deal was completed quickly at valuations from the frothy tech bull market of 2021. Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto via Getty ImagesThe slow breakdown of Twitter under Musk appears to be upon us. Mastodon has experienced a major influx of users, hitting more than 5 million accounts after Musk took over Twitter. With intense tech antitrust scrutiny, these new services are unlikely to be gobbled up by Big Tech.

☆ Twitter will lose over 32 million users by 2024 as Elon Musk's takeover causes more hate speech and technical problems, report says
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( Sawdah Bhaimiya | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Twitter could lose over 32 million users in the next two years, Insider Intelligence found. download the app Email address By clicking ‘Sign up’, you agree to be contacted by Insider Inc. and receive emails from Insider Intelligence and eMarketer (e.g. Twitter could lose more than 30 million users in the next two years after Elon Musk took over in November, data from Insider Intelligence showed. Users will abandon the platform as frustrations over mounting technical issues and increased hate speech and offensive content flood the platform, Insider Intelligence said. The forecast for Twitter ad revenue growth was also cut to "essentially flat," over the next two years, Insider Intelligence said.

☆ A fired Twitter engineer said he would have come up with 'way cleverer and more devastating jokes' about Elon Musk if he'd known he was getting canned
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-21 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A Twitter engineer said he believes he was fired for violating for criticizing Elon Musk on Slack. He said he would have come up with "way cleverer and more devastating jokes" if he'd known he'd be fired. then I would have come up with way cleverer and more devastating jokes," Fletcher tweeted. "I had meant to spend my whole career at Twitter," Fletcher added. In addition to the mass layoffs and targeted firings, dozens of Twitter workers have also been opting to leave the company.

☆ Former Twitter engineer compares company's current state to Looney Tunes character Wile E. Coyote running off a cliff
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-19 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter may have functionality issues after 1,200 employees resigned Thursday, NYT reported. One former engineer described the company like Wile E. Coyote running off a cliff. Making good on his promise to investors to cut staffing by 75%, Musk initiated layoffs immediately following the completion of the deal. One former engineer told The New York Times the company's current situation is similar to when the Looney Tunes character Wile E. Coyote runs off a cliff — continuing on in midair for a moment and plunging like a rock once he looks down. Musk and representatives for Twitter did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.

☆ Twitter Workers Brace for Another Round of Departures as Musk Ultimatum Looms
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( Alexa Corse | Sarah E. Needleman | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Twitter employees are bracing for another round of departures, after Elon Musk issued an ultimatum telling them to commit to “long hours at high intensity” or leave. Many staffers spent the past day weighing their options, after waking up Wednesday to an overnight email in which Mr. Musk told them to fill out a form by Thursday, 5 p.m. ET, to indicate if they want to remain at the company and are willing to be “extremely hardcore.” Employees who don’t opt in will be given three months of severance, Mr. Musk said.

Twitter did not immediately respond to request for comment on potential legal concerns. But they also cautioned that with many details still unknown, the full scope of legal consequences are as yet unclear. “We’re being flooded with inquiries from Twitter employees and are in the process of pursuing a variety of legal claims,” Shannon Liss-Riordan, a labor attorney who sued Twitter for violations of the WARN Act, told NBC News. “We are doing everything we can just to keep up with the new legal issues that he’s raising hour by hour,” Liss-Riordan said of Musk’s swift changes at Twitter. Twitter employees who do pursue legal action in California could benefit from "employee friendly protections" in that state, Nendel‑Flores said.

☆ Elon Musk Tells Twitter Staff to Work ‘Long Hours at High Intensity’ or Leave
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-16 | by ( Sarah E. Needleman | Alexa Corse | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Elon Musk emailed Twitter Inc. employees demanding that they commit to “long hours at high intensity” or leave, further roiling a staff already dealing with sweeping layoffs, mass executive departures and repeated business missteps under the billionaire’s ownership. Twitter employees must fill out a Google form by Thursday, 5 p.m. ET, to indicate if they want to remain at the company and are willing to work an intense regimen, according to the overnight email from Mr. Musk that many employees woke up to on Wednesday, with the subject line “A Fork in the Road.” Those who opt not to commit would be given three months of severance, he said.

☆ After Elon Musk fired Twitter staff for criticizing him, some remaining employees are hurriedly deleting Slack messages they fear he won't like
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-16 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Twitter staff are removing Slack messages they fear Elon Musk won't like, Platformer reported. This comes after the tech mogul fired some Twitter staff for criticizing him online. Engineers Eric Frohnhoefer, Sasha Solomon, and Ben Leib all appeared to be fired on Sunday and Monday for criticizing Musk. Platformer also reported that some of the fired employees had simply expressed sympathy with Frohnhoefer, Solomon, and Leib. Sources told The Times that some fired staff had shared news of Frohnhoefer's termination in internal chats.

☆ Layoff memos from tech companies illustrate how leaders need to show authentic regret over job cuts — and how damaging it can be when they don't
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-13 | by ( Shana Lebowitz | Rachel Durose | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Job cuts are never easy, but leaders' actions can lessen the sting of layoffs. Cuts at Meta, Twitter, and Stripe offer examples of what works — and what doesn't. Those contrite statements stand in contrast to a November 3 email that went to some 3,700 laid-off Twitter employees, about half of the company's workforce. Instead of apologizing, Musk, who is also the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, doubled down on his claims that the business was losing too much money to avoid workforce cuts. Twitter didn't tell employees why they were losing their jobsThe email to laid-off Twitter employees didn't explain the rationale behind the job cuts, though HR experts said that kind of clarity around what businesses sometimes call a "reduction in force," or RIF, is important.

☆ Elon Musk is now working out of Twitter headquarters, thanks employees for long hours
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-11 | by ( Lora Kolodny | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

On Friday, Twitter 's new owner Elon Musk sent a companywide email to employees of the social media giant thanking them for working long hours since he took over on Oct. 28. Two current Twitter employees told CNBC that they were fielding calls from colleagues and clients about all the changes to the platform. Two employees told CNBC that they have not gotten formal guidance from the company's human resources department on remote work. This week, Musk told Twitter employees that he was reversing the company's previous "work from home forever" policy which had been enacted by his personal friend and collaborator, former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Here's the e-mail from Elon Musk to Twitter employees on Friday, transcribed by CNBC:

Twitter Inc. suffered additional senior executive departures as owner Elon Musk said bankruptcy is a possibility for the company, adding to the chaos that has engulfed the social media platform in the two weeks since the billionaire took it over. Mr. Musk’s bankruptcy comment came in an all-hands meeting with Twitter’s staff on Thursday, according to people familiar with the matter, on the heels of a memo to employees in which he warned of the “dire” economic challenges facing the company. During the meeting, Mr. Musk also spoke about ending remote work for most Twitter employees, saying they needed to come to the office if able, the people said. He also gave the first public explanation for his recent sale of Tesla Inc. shares, saying he did it to help Twitter, one of the people said.

Elon Musk told Twitter employees that the company needs roughly half of its revenue to come from subscriptions. Elon Musk ordered the end of remote work for most Twitter Inc. employees as the departure of senior security and privacy executives from the company drew concern from federal regulators. “There is no way to sugarcoat the message,” Mr. Musk wrote in the overnight email, his first to the whole company, according to a copy of the message viewed by The Wall Street Journal. “The economic picture ahead is dire, especially for a company like ours that is so dependent on advertising in a challenging economic climate.”

In his first companywide email to Twitter employees, new owner and CEO Elon Musk said he was ending the social network's "work from home forever" policy. He also warned employees that the company might not survive the economic downturn without significant subscription revenue. From: Elon Musk [email removed] Date: Nov 9, 2022 [time stamp removed] To: Team Sorry that this is my first email to the whole company but there is no way to sugarcoat the message. We are also changing Twitter policy such that remote work is no longer allowed unless you have a specific exception. Thanks, ElonWATCH: Twitter is now Elon Musk's company — Here's how experts responded to the news

☆ Here's a rundown of tech companies that have announced layoffs in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-09 | by ( Sofia Pitt | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

Days after Twitter's new boss Elon Musk slashed half his company's workforce, Facebook parent Meta announced its most significant round of layoffs ever. Last month, Meta announced a second straight quarter of declining revenue and forecast another drop in the fourth quarter. The tech industry broadly has seen a string of layoffs in 2022 in the face of uncertain economic conditions. Lyft: around 700 jobs cutLyft announced last week that it cut 13% of its staff, or about 700 jobs. In a letter to employees, CEO Logan Green and President John Zimmer pointed to "a probable recession sometime in the next year" and rising rideshare insurance costs.

☆ Why Twitter's downloads and usage have surged following Elon Musk's takeover
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Twitter downloads and usage have surged. Elon Musk's leadership of Twitter so far has proved chaotic and unnerving for workers and advertisers, but users appear unfazed: Both the app's average daily downloads and daily average usage have increased considerably. According to data from Apptopia, daily downloads for November are already up 28% compared to October. Why Twitter usage may be soaring. An AI version of Elon Musk talked with us about Twitter, Trump, and Tesla.

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