Warning: How Elon ran Twitter and what he (likely) has planned for the US gov't

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Having read a lot about what happened at Twitter HQ after Elon bought the company back in 2022, I'm both shocked and unsurprised by what is happening now.

Back at Twitter, Elon enacted a number of changes to the company culture that were both controversial and led to lawsuits. He and Trump are now using the same playbook with the federal government, so it might be worth getting familiar with what he has planned:

• Massively cut the workforce:Mass layoffs: Elon Musk says he’s cut about 80% of Twitter’s staff



• Did not communicate to employees on what was happening and whether they had jobs: Confusion and Frustration Reign as Elon Musk Cuts Half of Twitter’s Staff



• Did not pay employees or former executives their promised severance, and won ensuing lawsuits: Elon Musk beats $500 million severance lawsuit by fired Twitter workers



• Unpaid bills with vendors stacked up as he stiffed them and dared them to sue (sounds like a mini-Donny): Musk stiffed Twitter vendors and dared them to sue—dozens did just that



• Scrapped remote work even for employees who were hired outside of an office location, and relocated Twitter's HQ from San Francisco to Texas: Elon Musk scraps Twitter’s work from home policy



• Instituted a "hardcore" working style (80 hour work weeks) that (salaried) employees had to agree to or leave if they were unwilling to sign his loyalty pledge: Musk Demands Twitter Employees Commit to ‘Extremely Hardcore’ Work Culture or Face Termination



• Installed a group of loyalist sycophants who employees referred to as "the goons" and who told employees to ignore laws, procurement best practices, and serious workplace safety concerns by building things like "hotel rooms" for employees to sleep in the office overnight with cheap locking doors: Apparently Elon Doesn’t Think He Needs To Pay Rent Because SF Is A ‘Shithole’; So Why Should We Pay For Twitter?[/li
  
  
• Terrorized rank and file employees by telling them that they had to print and present their most important code to him (he is not a qualified software engineer) and his imported goons from Tesla at a moment's notice: Elon Musk is bringing at least 50 engineers from Tesla to Twitter. Most have little to no experience designing social networks and use an entirely different programming language altogether, report says.
  



• If you're interested, this article has a pretty good (long) account of all the craziness that went on those weeks/ months: Extremely Hardcore
  

This only exposes what was happening inside the company, not all of the negative changes he made to the actual product - that would be another scary list.

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1. K&R