Twitter (1 Viewer)

[massraider]

I guess if you’re ExTReMe enough you find a way up to the 10th floor.

Live look at Twitter HQ.

Dang. I'm too slow.

 

[AAABatteries]

"Recent departures have left critical systems down to two, one or even zero engineers..."

"I know of six critical systems (like 'serving Tweets' level of critical) which no longer have any engineers.... It will continue to coast until it runs into something and then it will stop."

Did you try rebooting it?

 

[Juxtatarot]

I still remember my BASIC. Might apply.

10 REM SALIENT CODE
20 PRINT “SALIENT CODE”

That’s the best I can do.

 

[Scoresman]

https://twitter.com/Popehat/status/1593659412794613760?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1593659412794613760%7Ctwgr%5Ed265eb25c7b791f5044742c00731df847fb4e15b%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fforums.somethingawful.com%2Fshowthread.php%3Fthreadid%3D4000485userid%3D0perpage%3D40pagenumber%3D345

 

[GroveDiesel]

Musk sent a follow up email encouraging employees to fly to SF for this. Reportedly.

 

[uwillbsoon]

https://twitter.com/ZoeSchiffer/status/1593665774744350721?t=lbGm7R9_OpJKv7zBjxhfCQ&s=19

He's just trolling remote employees, right?

 

[Scoresman]

So the people who stuck around after the initial ultimatum and culling, now have to fly to SF to interview for their current jobs.

 

[AAABatteries]

It's 2022. The pandemic started in 2020. We have gobs of experience with working in offices and very little experience with working from home. So I'm extremely skeptical of broad, sweeping generalizations about how people are "archaic" for preferring work arrangements that were functioning pretty well until two years ago.

Because WFH is so new, we haven't really had a chance to explore how WFH affects things like work-life balance. Obviously this isn't the case for everyone, but for me personally, I am done for the day when I leave the office. I almost never take work home. I respond to email pretty much 24/7, but that's it. Having experienced both, I very strongly prefer the office. It's nice knowing that I can always keep things going from my living room if I'm feeling a little under the weather or something, but I'm positive I would not want that to be my default workday.

And I say that as somebody who is allowed to do his job with (almost) nobody looking over his shoulder. Lots of workers in lots of jobs need supervision. That's not because the boss is tyrannical or paranoid or weak. Human beings have slacked off at their jobs since the dawn of time, and we all hang out here as a form of work avoidance so we're no exception. For me, working from home is fairly pleasant. It wouldn't be pleasant if somebody from IT was checking my keystrokes, or they made me put a camera on my machine to verify that I was actually in front of my screen and not just cooking or watching television. I'm okay with certain "invasions of privacy" in my workplace but would not be at all okay with those exact same measures being imposed on my home office.

And that's just one dimension of this whole discussion. This is one of those topics that I think really separates the people who have heard of Chesterton's fence from the people who haven't.

I somewhat agree - but for those of us who did WFH some before the pandemic we already knew the pro's/con's. Granted doing it in mass and with certain roles is somewhat new but I don't need to have somebody evaluate anything to know that my quality of life and my productivity were both going up by WFH most/all the time.

 

[SWC]

working from home is probably better for the environment unless you fart a lot a lot because you are at home and just dont give a damn any more so there is that take that to the bank brohans

 

[Juxtatarot]

New Musk tweet:

“ New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.

Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.

You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.”

I don’t think advertisers will like this.

 

[Capella]

https://twitter.com/ZoeSchiffer/status/1593665774744350721?t=lbGm7R9_OpJKv7zBjxhfCQ&s=19

He's just trolling remote employees, right?

Sounds like a guy who probably needs some rest.

 

[BlackCrowes]

I still remember my BASIC. Might apply.

10 REM SALIENT CODE
20 PRINT “SALIENT CODE”

That’s the best I can do.

30 GOTO 20

 

[massraider]

New Musk tweet:

“ New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.

Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.

You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.”

Okay, so that's cool for stand alone tweets.

What about replies to tweets from popular accounts? What about negative/hate responses to Elon Musk tweets?

 

[Juxtatarot]

New Musk tweet:

“ New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.

Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.

You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.”

Okay, so that's cool for stand alone tweets.

What about replies to tweets from popular accounts? What about negative/hate responses to Elon Musk tweets?

Will their systems be able to properly identify hate tweets to begin with? Obviously there can be trigger words but a lot of this can depend on context and be difficult for AI to pick up on. I’ll bet there will be chronic abusers who learn how to game the system.

 

[uwillbsoon]

New Musk tweet:

“ New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.

Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.

You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.”

Okay, so that's cool for stand alone tweets.

What about replies to tweets from popular accounts? What about negative/hate responses to Elon Musk tweets?

Will their systems be able to properly identify hate tweets to begin with? Obviously there can be trigger words but a lot of this can depend on context and be difficult for AI to pick up on. I’ll bet there will be chronic abusers who learn how to game the system.

My understanding is this is why they had thousands of contractors. A lot of them were on the content moderation team.

It's very difficult to engineer content moderation. Twitter tried but couldn't do turned back to people. If musk can, kudos to him. That would save them a ton of money.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

New Musk tweet:

“ New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.

Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.

You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.”

I don’t think advertisers will like this.

I'm the opposite here. I don't like the idea of having tweets from people I follow de-boosted. I don't follow anyone who uses racial slurs, and I have zero trust in Twitter moderators to determine what's unacceptably hateful or negative. The Trust Ship sailed a few years ago.

Actually, if Twitter were somehow able to credibly commit to moderating this sort of thing the same way FBG does, that would be great. I just don't think they'll be able to do so.

 

[the moops]

I am equally unproductive from home or at the office

 

[massraider]

Actually, if Twitter were somehow able to credibly commit to moderating this sort of thing the same way FBG does, that would be great. I just don't think they'll be able to do so.

It would be left up to an algorithm

 

[eoMMan]

WFH is awesome. You save money by not having to buy gas/maintenance, you get extra time to sleep/exercise/whatever instead of sitting in traffic, you get to wear athletic shorts with comfortable tshirts instead usual office attire, etc etc.

That being said, even if workers are productive at home, they are missing out on things at the office. I’m not talking about water cooler type stuff but stuff that pops up hear and there that isn’t always addressed in meetings. You’re sometimes out of the loop by being out of the office (assuming there are a bunch still in the office).

IMO, I think a 50/50 or 60/40 split is ideal. WFH is a great perk to attract employees.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Actually, if Twitter were somehow able to credibly commit to moderating this sort of thing the same way FBG does, that would be great. I just don't think they'll be able to do so.

It would be left up to an algorithm

Of course. But a) it's hard to teach an algorithm how to moderate content if you want to do anything besides ban certain words and b) algorithms can always be changed.

 

[Terminalxylem]

It’s interesting that a lot of guys in here are calling Musk archaic because he is trying to get people back into the office. And its understandable - we are a bunch of old farts with long careers and wives and families and all these responsibilities.

But I can tell you, I know a handful of recently graduated college kids who WANT some kind of office experience. That is where they meet people, actually learn their jobs, go out for beers with their colleagues….etc….

I know some kids who have turned down full work from home jobs because they want to meet people and be around like minded workers.

They are young and are just starting their lives. Don’t assume that concept is so archaic. And as these covid kids grow up who were isolated for two years, they are going to need that office experience. They are going to need to be around people.

Now, I know for some jobs working at home is much better for them, and Musk should be flexible of course. But I can see a shift BACK to the office environment for these young workers who need that kind of thing.

On the WFH stuff I find a ton of different arguments. I personally find the argument "you are more productive when you're in the office" and/or "you need to be in the office so I can keep an eye on you" which Musk is making to be archaic for certain. That sort of black/white thinking is very archaic IMO. Of course WFH is not for everyone nor can everyone do it well. That's different than the construct itself being archaic. I don't think that's been said. A TON of people had their eyes opened to what I've known for 20 years. WFH is going to become a benefit of employment at some point. It will be valued/factored differently from one person to the next for sure.

I agree with you. We're dreading the WFH movement from the opposite end of the spectrum. Certain positions and jobs will never be able to work from home and we've already lost good people to those WFH jobs and it's starting to limit the candidate pool. Our people with experience are leaving for it because it's something new that fits their schedules better. The younger crowd seems much less interested in cubical working these days. It's really limiting the candidate pool and what we're viewing as an acceptable new hire.

We make our own problem worse with a lack of accountability because there is a fear we can't hire someone better. Hopefully this trend reverses, but we've been hurting for several years now.

Pandemic realizations are going to have a meaningful impact on a lot of industries IMO. You give a really good example of what I'm talking about. It's my guess that some will want to have a job where this sort of thing is an option and not all jobs can be done this way. It's likely going to create shortages in those areas not unlike the push when I was a kid where the only "successful" people in life were "college educated". Look what that did to our trade industries. There are going to be similar impacts to industries where WFH isn't an option IMO.

For a tech company like Twitter, what needs to be accomplished in-person anyway?

 

[bigbottom]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

 

[Scoresman]

It’s interesting that a lot of guys in here are calling Musk archaic because he is trying to get people back into the office. And its understandable - we are a bunch of old farts with long careers and wives and families and all these responsibilities.

But I can tell you, I know a handful of recently graduated college kids who WANT some kind of office experience. That is where they meet people, actually learn their jobs, go out for beers with their colleagues….etc….

I know some kids who have turned down full work from home jobs because they want to meet people and be around like minded workers.

They are young and are just starting their lives. Don’t assume that concept is so archaic. And as these covid kids grow up who were isolated for two years, they are going to need that office experience. They are going to need to be around people.

Now, I know for some jobs working at home is much better for them, and Musk should be flexible of course. But I can see a shift BACK to the office environment for these young workers who need that kind of thing.

On the WFH stuff I find a ton of different arguments. I personally find the argument "you are more productive when you're in the office" and/or "you need to be in the office so I can keep an eye on you" which Musk is making to be archaic for certain. That sort of black/white thinking is very archaic IMO. Of course WFH is not for everyone nor can everyone do it well. That's different than the construct itself being archaic. I don't think that's been said. A TON of people had their eyes opened to what I've known for 20 years. WFH is going to become a benefit of employment at some point. It will be valued/factored differently from one person to the next for sure.

I agree with you. We're dreading the WFH movement from the opposite end of the spectrum. Certain positions and jobs will never be able to work from home and we've already lost good people to those WFH jobs and it's starting to limit the candidate pool. Our people with experience are leaving for it because it's something new that fits their schedules better. The younger crowd seems much less interested in cubical working these days. It's really limiting the candidate pool and what we're viewing as an acceptable new hire.

We make our own problem worse with a lack of accountability because there is a fear we can't hire someone better. Hopefully this trend reverses, but we've been hurting for several years now.

Pandemic realizations are going to have a meaningful impact on a lot of industries IMO. You give a really good example of what I'm talking about. It's my guess that some will want to have a job where this sort of thing is an option and not all jobs can be done this way. It's likely going to create shortages in those areas not unlike the push when I was a kid where the only "successful" people in life were "college educated". Look what that did to our trade industries. There are going to be similar impacts to industries where WFH isn't an option IMO.

For a tech company like Twitter, what needs to be accomplished in-person anyway?

The only reason I've ever heard from the few remaining co-workers I have who don't like WFH is some derivative of "I miss seeing everyone's faces!" That's all anybody ever says.

 

[Scoresman]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

What stopped them from doing this before the pandemic when everyone was in the office? It has to cost companies even more to have people in the office due to increased overhead.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

 

[Joe Bryant]

A Last-Longer over/under bet on Liz Truss as England's PM vs. how long Twitter survives with Elon running it would have been an amazing bet. "My money's on the lettuce".

Hi @Runkle. What's your date on how much longer Twitter survives with Musk running it? Do you really think it's 49 more days like Truss?

 

[bigbottom]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

What stopped them from doing this before the pandemic when everyone was in the office? It has to cost companies even more to have people in the office due to increased overhead.

Inertia.

 

[Brony]

I've worked in a full-time 'in the office' job. I've worked in a place that wanted workers there 80 hours.

These are two very different asks of people.

 

[uwillbsoon]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

I mean, didn't this happen a long time ago in tech? Offshoring? And wasn't it mostly a failure?

 

[Terminalxylem]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Maybe, but job security isn’t itself a good enough reason to go through the motions of showing up to work in-person. I know employers’ concerns, but has anyone objectively shown that WFH reduces productivity?

 

[Dr. Octopus]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

It seems this fear would only really apply to lower level positions like data entry or first ticket IT positions if the threat is going oversees for cheaper labor - and that threat has been there for a long time.

Educated professionals overseas aren’t working much cheaper, if any, than their American counterparts and a lot of business operate in global markets anyway. It also takes time and money to educate people about your products and operations so even sales positions in narrow markets can’t be easily replaced by unskilled overseas people.

 

[bigbottom]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

I mean, didn't this happen a long time ago in tech? Offshoring? And wasn't it mostly a failure?

I have no idea as I’m not particularly well-versed on the topic. But my sense is that pre-pandemic efforts were largely focused on particular types of work. Today, remote work is regularly provided in a vastly wider array of industries and functions (sales, marketing, management, HR admin, accounting, analytics, etc.), many of which may be far easier to offshore now that companies, by virtue of the pandemic, have had to restructure themselves to be able to efficiently rely on remote workers to deliver work product. I’m sure that things are far more complex and nuanced than I appreciate. But bottom line, if my job could be performed by anyone anywhere in the world with my skill set, I’d be far more concerned about competition and downward pressure on my compensation. Thankfully (for me since I prefer to work in the office), my company wants a person in my position to be in office, and scarcity of competition makes me far more valuable. Again, not trying to rain on anyone’s parade and I’m about as far from an expert as you can get.

 

[bigbottom]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Maybe, but job security isn’t itself a good enough reason to go through the motions of showing up to work in-person. I know employers’ concerns, but has anyone objectively shown that WFH reduces productivity?

My point isn’t about employers’ concerns, or based on argument that WFH reduces productivity. It’s more a matter of employers leveraging the new paradigm to lower personnel costs now that the labor market for your job is a global one (speaking generally, not necessarily your job).

 

[Leeroy Jenkins]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

We are looking at that for certain accounting positions.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I have no idea as I’m not particularly well-versed on the topic. But my sense is that pre-pandemic efforts were largely focused on particular types of work. Today, remote work is regularly provided in a vastly wider array of industries and functions (sales, marketing, management, HR admin, accounting, analytics, etc.), many of which may be far easier to offshore now that companies, by virtue of the pandemic, have had to restructure themselves to be able to efficiently rely on remote workers to deliver work product. I’m sure that things are far more complex and nuanced than I appreciate. But bottom line, if my job could be performed by anyone anywhere in the world with my skill set, I’d be far more concerned about competition and downward pressure on my compensation. Thankfully (for me since I prefer to work in the office), my company wants a person in my position to be in office, and scarcity of competition makes me far more valuable. Again, not trying to rain on anyone’s parade and I’m about as far from an expert as you can get.

We don't even have to be talking about overseas competition necessarily. There are lots of highly-skilled people who are just as good at my job as I am who live in low cost-of-living areas. They'd be happy to do my job at a discount. Well, not my job personally because I'm in a low COL area too, but my salary goes a really long way in the upper Midwest, the south, and the southwest. It's a pittance in the Bay area and the NYC-DC corridor. Firms in those areas can shave labor costs and simultaneously improve the quality of their workforce by recruiting nationally. If they really believe in full-time WFH. Which they don't.

 

[The General]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

I don't think there is a one size fits all answer but being in the same time zone or relatively close is key for my work as there is collaborating, meetings etc that happen throughout the day as well as lots of random questions that pop-up that need relatively quick answers.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Maybe, but job security isn’t itself a good enough reason to go through the motions of showing up to work in-person. I know employers’ concerns, but has anyone objectively shown that WFH reduces productivity?

If you want firms to go this route, the burden of proof is going to be on you to show that WFH doesn't reduce productivity. The intuitive common-sense case for why people are more likely to shirk when they are unmonitored in their own homes is too compelling.

 

[Desert_Power]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

I mean, didn't this happen a long time ago in tech? Offshoring? And wasn't it mostly a failure?

I have no idea as I’m not particularly well-versed on the topic. But my sense is that pre-pandemic efforts were largely focused on particular types of work. Today, remote work is regularly provided in a vastly wider array of industries and functions (sales, marketing, management, HR admin, accounting, analytics, etc.), many of which may be far easier to offshore now that companies, by virtue of the pandemic, have had to restructure themselves to be able to efficiently rely on remote workers to deliver work product. I’m sure that things are far more complex and nuanced than I appreciate. But bottom line, if my job could be performed by anyone anywhere in the world with my skill set, I’d be far more concerned about competition and downward pressure on my compensation. Thankfully (for me since I prefer to work in the office), my company wants a person in my position to be in office, and scarcity of competition makes me far more valuable. Again, not trying to rain on anyone’s parade and I’m about as far from an expert as you can get.

A lot of these fields have been under pressure from automation and offshoring for over a decade in my industry. Personally, I welcome these trends if they can help me work on higher value items but it's harder to find good talent overseas than you'd think. I'm continuously disappointed with work product coming out of India and think it's foolish to keep hiring over there instead of just automating roles. It is easier to accommodate meeting times with these folks without a commute though.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I don't think there is a one size fits all answer but being in the same time zone or relatively close is key for my work as there is collaborating, meetings etc that happen throughout the day as well as lots of random questions that pop-up that need relatively quick answers.

I work in higher ed administration, which is not exactly a culture where people are chained to their desk from 8-5. Faculty come and go pretty much whenever they feel like it, and everybody is okay with that. We're not a bank or something.

One thing I've noticed this year specifically is a widespread acknowledgement that things actually did slip when we went to WFH, and it was exactly the kind of stuff you're talking about. The big problems all got handled just fine. It was the little stuff that would normally get resolved by pulling somebody aside for two minutes before some meeting on some other unrelated topic. Or stuff that pops into your head when you pass the right person in the hallway. None of those issues cause the world to stop spinning on its axis or anything, but I think it disabused people of the idea that we can do our jobs remotely over an extended period of time.

If we were forced to go back to WFH for some reason, I'm sure we could figure out a way to resolve stuff like that over Slack or something similar. It's just that there's a lot serendipity to working in physical proximity that is very valuable in some industries and irrelevant in others. I can see where code people and HR drones do well in WFH settings.

 

[The Commish]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

In tech? That's already happening and it's a mixed bag. Typically, they make this move for "cost" reasons. WFH helps alleviate that by a lot.

 

[Capella]

A Last-Longer over/under bet on Liz Truss as England's PM vs. how long Twitter survives with Elon running it would have been an amazing bet. "My money's on the lettuce".

Hi @Runkle. What's your date on how much longer Twitter survives with Musk running it? Do you really think it's 49 more days like Truss?

You didn’t ask me but the outcome here will be Musk declaring bankruptcy to try and escape his massive debt on this, somebody else (meta??) picking it up on the cheap (less than 10b which is it’s worth), cleaning up his galactic mess and trying to put it back together and earn enough trust back from advertisers to make it profitable.

The chances of Musk succeeding and owning Twitter 5 years from now is <5% imo.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

You didn’t ask me but the outcome here will be Musk declaring bankruptcy to try and escape his massive debt on this, somebody else (meta??) picking it up on the cheap (less than 10b which is it’s worth), cleaning up his galactic mess and trying to put it back together and earn enough trust back from advertisers to make it profitable.

The chances of Musk succeeding and owning Twitter 5 years from now is <5% imo.

I dunno. He's stubborn enough, and rich enough, to try and ride it out.

Agree he'll never make money on it now though. Even it it becomes consistently profitable there's probably been too much value destroyed. And he overpaid to begin with.

 

[uwillbsoon]

I’m a dinosaur who likes to go into the office. So I may be completely off base and out of touch with the following observation. But for those who are big time proponents of WFH, isn’t there a real risk that when your role, department, industry etc. is fully accepted as, and transitions to, a WFH environment that the companies will start shifting your jobs overseas to remote workers at half or a third of the pay with no benefits?

Yup.

I mean, didn't this happen a long time ago in tech? Offshoring? And wasn't it mostly a failure?

I have no idea as I’m not particularly well-versed on the topic. But my sense is that pre-pandemic efforts were largely focused on particular types of work. Today, remote work is regularly provided in a vastly wider array of industries and functions (sales, marketing, management, HR admin, accounting, analytics, etc.), many of which may be far easier to offshore now that companies, by virtue of the pandemic, have had to restructure themselves to be able to efficiently rely on remote workers to deliver work product. I’m sure that things are far more complex and nuanced than I appreciate. But bottom line, if my job could be performed by anyone anywhere in the world with my skill set, I’d be far more concerned about competition and downward pressure on my compensation. Thankfully (for me since I prefer to work in the office), my company wants a person in my position to be in office, and scarcity of competition makes me far more valuable. Again, not trying to rain on anyone’s parade and I’m about as far from an expert as you can get.

A lot of these fields have been under pressure from automation and offshoring for over a decade in my industry. Personally, I welcome these trends if they can help me work on higher value items but it's harder to find good talent overseas than you'd think. I'm continuously disappointed with work product coming out of India and think it's foolish to keep hiring over there instead of just automating roles. It is easier to accommodate meeting times with these folks without a commute though.

Yeah, I'm more concerned about AI/automation advancements in my field than overseas workers. Or even workers in the US in low cost of living areas.

 

[uwillbsoon]

A Last-Longer over/under bet on Liz Truss as England's PM vs. how long Twitter survives with Elon running it would have been an amazing bet. "My money's on the lettuce".

Hi @Runkle. What's your date on how much longer Twitter survives with Musk running it? Do you really think it's 49 more days like Truss?

You didn’t ask me but the outcome here will be Musk declaring bankruptcy to try and escape his massive debt on this, somebody else (meta??) picking it up on the cheap (less than 10b which is it’s worth), cleaning up his galactic mess and trying to put it back together and earn enough trust back from advertisers to make it profitable.

The chances of Musk succeeding and owning Twitter 5 years from now is <5% imo.

Microsoft should buy it at a discount.

 

[Capella]

I dunno. He's stubborn enough, and rich enough, to try and ride it out.

I actually think he knows he’s holding a losing hand here and some of the crazy is to take the value down low enough to make the bankruptcy realistic. I mean maybe he’s just a total idiot, I can’t really tell.

 

[The Commish]

@bigbottom

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

Here's a Ted Talk on a case study in Shanghai.....similar findings have been here in the US as well...various studies out there on it. More point to a net benefit than a net hindrance.

 

[bigbottom]

@bigbottom

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

Here's a Ted Talk on a case study in Shanghai.....similar findings have been here in the US as well...various studies out there on it. More point to a net benefit than a net hindrance.

Thanks. I will give it a listen when I have a moment. Given the description (and the first minute I listened to just now), is it about the productivity of remote workers? If so, I just want to be clear that I haven’t argued that remote workers are less productive, or that companies with remote workers are less successful. My issue was that the remote work structure expands labor availability and as a result puts downward pressure on compensation (which is of course a benefit to companies). Maybe the TedTalk speaks to this. Someone upthread mentioned having to pay people more to go into the office. That makes sense. But so does the corollary.

 

[Leroy Hoard]

As far as the whole WFH thing goes, I just like the idea of no longer having to wear pants.

 

[Sammy3469]

A Last-Longer over/under bet on Liz Truss as England's PM vs. how long Twitter survives with Elon running it would have been an amazing bet. "My money's on the lettuce".

Hi @Runkle. What's your date on how much longer Twitter survives with Musk running it? Do you really think it's 49 more days like Truss?

You didn’t ask me but the outcome here will be Musk declaring bankruptcy to try and escape his massive debt on this, somebody else (meta??) picking it up on the cheap (less than 10b which is it’s worth), cleaning up his galactic mess and trying to put it back together and earn enough trust back from advertisers to make it profitable.

The chances of Musk succeeding and owning Twitter 5 years from now is <5% imo.

A big part of me thinks the plan all along was to either quickly "fix" it or bankrupt it in order to write it off against Tesla cap gains. Very binary, but he hasn't done anything to dissuade me from that view.

 

[massraider]

I actually think he knows he’s holding a losing hand here and some of the crazy is to take the value down low enough to make the bankruptcy realistic. I mean maybe he’s just a total idiot, I can’t really tell

I think it's very possible that he's too big to fail.

Between some alarmed Tesla stockholders, and his new besties in Saudi Arabia, his South Korean SpaceX investors, could they collectively bail him out of Twitter, just to save the value of the other companies? Why not? Coud Saudi Arabia eat his whole debt just to maintain their interest in Twitter? Sure.