‘Goodbye Twitter’ and ‘RIP Twitter’ trends as employees quit

“Goodbye Twitter” and “Rest in Peace Twitter” was ironically trending on Twitter on Friday, after the new owner Elon Musk had asked employees to sign on to his new “hardcore” culture at the social media platform.

Many reportedly said no, resulting in a max exodus of staff leaving the company, potentially putting Twitter’s operations at risk, according to people familiar with the matter.

Sweeping changes

The world’s richest man has been making sweeping changes since he finalised a deal to buy the company for about $44 billion on October 27.

After firing half of Twitter’s employees, he gave the remaining workers an ultimatum to pledge working under his new hard-charging culture or get out.

According to an internal memo and the companywide ultimatum, workers were asked to follow a link to confirm their commitment, latest by Thursday if they still want to be part of the new outfit.

ALSO READ: Work ‘long hours at high intensity’ or leave, Elon Musk warns Twitter employees

Max exodus

However, many, it seems, decided to leave posting farewell messages and salute emojis on the Slack instant messaging platform announcing they had said “no” to Musk’s ultimatum.

“I’m not pressing the button,” one departing employee posted, according to The Verge. “My watch ends with Twitter 1.0. I do not wish to be part of Twitter 2.0.”

“It feels like all the people who made this place incredible are leaving,” messaged another staffer. “It will be extremely hard for Twitter to recover from here, no matter how hardcore the people who remain try to be.”

Promises

Employees deciding to leave the social media platform were reportedly told they will receive a severance package of at least three months’ pay, while those who have decided to stay do not know how Musk plans to compensate them with stock options now that it is a private company.

Musk not worried

The max exodus of staff did not really deter Musk on Friday.

Taking to his social media platform, Musk tweeted a series of memes while at the same time singing the praises of his company

“And … we just hit another all-time high in Twitter usage lol. Let that sink in,” he tweeted.

In a tweet Thursday evening, Musk said: “The best people are staying, so I’m not super worried.”

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