- ExSp33db1rd
- Chief Pilot
- Posts: 3237
- Joined: Sat Sep 12, 2015 1:51 am
- Location: Lesser Antipode
- Gender:
- Age: 89
Re: Twitter
Ditto, wouldn't even know how to start. The mobile phone isn't the centre of my life.
Re: Twitter
Twitter pulls paid verification after impersonators flourish
The sudden absence of the service adds to a series of whiplash product moves in the two weeks Musk has controlled the company.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/crypto/twi ... -rcna56730
Twitter has suspended sign-ups for its Blue subscription service after the initial rollout was marred by users who received a paid verification badge and then impersonated celebrities, politicians and brands.
Twitter users first began noticing the change late Thursday night when the Blue subscription option was no longer in the sidebar menu of the app. The sign-up page for Twitter Blue appears to still direct to a page with information about the service but without an option to sign up.
It was not immediately clear if or when the service would be restored.
The sudden absence of the service — which CEO Elon Musk has touted as an important step as Twitter looks to increase revenue and decrease the prevalence of bots and trolls — adds to a series of whiplash product moves in the two weeks Musk has controlled the company.
One sales employee at Twitter said the company decided to pull back the Twitter Blue verified service after a number of accounts began impersonating companies using accounts with paid-verification badges, which looked the same as Twitter’s original verification badges for notable public figures and brands.
Even another Elon Musk venture, electric car maker Tesla, could not be protected by Twitter from an impersonator disparaging the brand.
The employee, who asked to remain unnamed citing fear of retaliation, said an account created in the likeness of the drug company Eli Lilly caused a particularly serious problem on Thursday when it tweeted out, “we are excited to announce insulin is free now.”
That tweet went viral and remained on the social media platform for at least two hours before it was taken down. The real Eli Lilly account later tweeted: “We apologize to those who have been served a misleading message from a fake Lilly account.”
Eli Lilly’s stock price dropped sharply after the fake tweet was posted, as did those of other pharmaceutical companies, including AbbVie, which was also impersonated. Major stock indices were broadly positive Thursday, with the S&P 500 posting its biggest rally in two years.
Internal communications obtained by CNBC indicate that Twitter support initially determined that the tweet impersonating Eli Lilly did not constitute a violation of the company’s terms of service. A sales employee said they encouraged clients to tweet directly at Elon Musk about their problems.
Twitter also re-introduced a newer “Official” badge to some accounts. The company confirmed that news on one of its Twitter accounts.
The pullback of Twitter Blue verified also comes as the company’s new leadership is considering how to comply with oversight from the Federal Trade Commission, according to company-wide emails sent to employees on Thursday night, obtained by CNBC.
Twitter is currently under a consent decree from the FTC, which forces it to notify the agency about new products with a written plan, among other things.
Some employees had expressed doubt about Musk’s willingness to comply with FTC oversight. Earlier in the week, internal communications on a company message board, which were viewed by NBC news, showed that employees were concerned about whether Twitter’s new leaders would ask them to do any work that could comprise a violation of the consent decree, or any other laws and regulations.
Three of Twitter’s top executives in the areas of security, safety and privacy resigned Wednesday.
Musk wrote in a company wide email on Thursday night: “I cannot emphasize enough that Twitter will do whatever it takes to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the FTC consent decree. Anything you read to the contrary is absolutely false. The same goes for any other government regulatory matters where Twitter operates.”
Musk did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment. The FTC did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Attorney Alex Spiro added in a separate e-mail on Thursday, “We spoke to the FTC today about our continuing obligations and have a constructive ongoing dialogue. We will of course remain in compliance with the consent decree and the legal department is handling it and happy to answer any questions.”
In his other businesses, Tesla and SpaceX, Musk often clashes with government regulators. For example, he was charged with civil securities fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission, has proclaimed that he does not respect the financial regulators and accused them in court of trying to “chill” his free speech rights through their oversight of his Tesla shareholder communications.
He has also accused the federal vehicle safety regulators, NHTSA, of hiring a safety adviser who was biased against Tesla, and of using “outdated and inaccurate terminology.” And he has accused the Federal Aviation Administration of having a “fundamentally broken regulatory structure,” after it failed to promptly approve a SpaceX test launch.
Justin Brookman, a former FTC official and now the director of technology policy for the advocacy group Consumer Reports, said Musk would be risking Twitter’s finances if it is found to be violating the terms of the consent decree. And the cost will likely be a lot more than the $150 million fine imposed this past spring on the social media giant by federal regulators over accusations of deceptive practices.
“We’re off the map here, and all eyes are on him,” Brookman said of Musk.
He added that it would be a “serious violation” of the consent decree if Musk is found to have been stripping certain privacy or security practices or launching new products without proper security checks. In addition, the new paid check mark program under the Twitter Blue subscription service is going to raise red flags with the FTC because it has already led to the impersonation of celebrities and brands in a potentially harmful way, Brookman said.
“In assuming someone’s identity, most of it is playful, and a lot of it has been making fun of Elon, but there is a lot of potential for mischief,” Brookman said. “And after a lot of privacy or security executives left or were dismissed, you have to question if Twitter security is still looking constantly for security holes as they should be doing or if there’s a dialing back in security efforts and if that is going to increase some chance of a system failure.”
William Kovacic, an antitrust professor at George Washington University Law School who served as FTC chairman during the George W. Bush administration, said the exodus of multiple C-suite level executives is going to raise alarms with federal regulators, and at the least, they’ll want to know what promises Musk can make to ensure Twitter’s security safeguards haven’t eroded.
Should Twitter be found in violation of the consent decree, Musk would face major fines akin to the $5 billion settlement that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg reached with the FTC in 2019 over alleged violations of user privacy data, Kovacic added.
“Not only will you have to write a big check, but you’ll see the imposition of further controls,” he said.
Twitter’s consent decree does not require its CEO to have to certify compliance, but the FTC could force Musk to personally file reports confirming that every facet of the agreement is being followed, just as Zuckerberg has had to do as part of Facebook’s settlement.
Musk “would get the Zuckerberg deal plus,” Kovacic said.
PP
![Surprise :-o](./images/smilies/13.gif)
The sudden absence of the service adds to a series of whiplash product moves in the two weeks Musk has controlled the company.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/crypto/twi ... -rcna56730
Twitter has suspended sign-ups for its Blue subscription service after the initial rollout was marred by users who received a paid verification badge and then impersonated celebrities, politicians and brands.
Twitter users first began noticing the change late Thursday night when the Blue subscription option was no longer in the sidebar menu of the app. The sign-up page for Twitter Blue appears to still direct to a page with information about the service but without an option to sign up.
It was not immediately clear if or when the service would be restored.
The sudden absence of the service — which CEO Elon Musk has touted as an important step as Twitter looks to increase revenue and decrease the prevalence of bots and trolls — adds to a series of whiplash product moves in the two weeks Musk has controlled the company.
One sales employee at Twitter said the company decided to pull back the Twitter Blue verified service after a number of accounts began impersonating companies using accounts with paid-verification badges, which looked the same as Twitter’s original verification badges for notable public figures and brands.
Even another Elon Musk venture, electric car maker Tesla, could not be protected by Twitter from an impersonator disparaging the brand.
The employee, who asked to remain unnamed citing fear of retaliation, said an account created in the likeness of the drug company Eli Lilly caused a particularly serious problem on Thursday when it tweeted out, “we are excited to announce insulin is free now.”
That tweet went viral and remained on the social media platform for at least two hours before it was taken down. The real Eli Lilly account later tweeted: “We apologize to those who have been served a misleading message from a fake Lilly account.”
Eli Lilly’s stock price dropped sharply after the fake tweet was posted, as did those of other pharmaceutical companies, including AbbVie, which was also impersonated. Major stock indices were broadly positive Thursday, with the S&P 500 posting its biggest rally in two years.
Internal communications obtained by CNBC indicate that Twitter support initially determined that the tweet impersonating Eli Lilly did not constitute a violation of the company’s terms of service. A sales employee said they encouraged clients to tweet directly at Elon Musk about their problems.
Twitter also re-introduced a newer “Official” badge to some accounts. The company confirmed that news on one of its Twitter accounts.
The pullback of Twitter Blue verified also comes as the company’s new leadership is considering how to comply with oversight from the Federal Trade Commission, according to company-wide emails sent to employees on Thursday night, obtained by CNBC.
Twitter is currently under a consent decree from the FTC, which forces it to notify the agency about new products with a written plan, among other things.
Some employees had expressed doubt about Musk’s willingness to comply with FTC oversight. Earlier in the week, internal communications on a company message board, which were viewed by NBC news, showed that employees were concerned about whether Twitter’s new leaders would ask them to do any work that could comprise a violation of the consent decree, or any other laws and regulations.
Three of Twitter’s top executives in the areas of security, safety and privacy resigned Wednesday.
Musk wrote in a company wide email on Thursday night: “I cannot emphasize enough that Twitter will do whatever it takes to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the FTC consent decree. Anything you read to the contrary is absolutely false. The same goes for any other government regulatory matters where Twitter operates.”
Musk did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment. The FTC did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Attorney Alex Spiro added in a separate e-mail on Thursday, “We spoke to the FTC today about our continuing obligations and have a constructive ongoing dialogue. We will of course remain in compliance with the consent decree and the legal department is handling it and happy to answer any questions.”
In his other businesses, Tesla and SpaceX, Musk often clashes with government regulators. For example, he was charged with civil securities fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission, has proclaimed that he does not respect the financial regulators and accused them in court of trying to “chill” his free speech rights through their oversight of his Tesla shareholder communications.
He has also accused the federal vehicle safety regulators, NHTSA, of hiring a safety adviser who was biased against Tesla, and of using “outdated and inaccurate terminology.” And he has accused the Federal Aviation Administration of having a “fundamentally broken regulatory structure,” after it failed to promptly approve a SpaceX test launch.
Justin Brookman, a former FTC official and now the director of technology policy for the advocacy group Consumer Reports, said Musk would be risking Twitter’s finances if it is found to be violating the terms of the consent decree. And the cost will likely be a lot more than the $150 million fine imposed this past spring on the social media giant by federal regulators over accusations of deceptive practices.
“We’re off the map here, and all eyes are on him,” Brookman said of Musk.
He added that it would be a “serious violation” of the consent decree if Musk is found to have been stripping certain privacy or security practices or launching new products without proper security checks. In addition, the new paid check mark program under the Twitter Blue subscription service is going to raise red flags with the FTC because it has already led to the impersonation of celebrities and brands in a potentially harmful way, Brookman said.
“In assuming someone’s identity, most of it is playful, and a lot of it has been making fun of Elon, but there is a lot of potential for mischief,” Brookman said. “And after a lot of privacy or security executives left or were dismissed, you have to question if Twitter security is still looking constantly for security holes as they should be doing or if there’s a dialing back in security efforts and if that is going to increase some chance of a system failure.”
William Kovacic, an antitrust professor at George Washington University Law School who served as FTC chairman during the George W. Bush administration, said the exodus of multiple C-suite level executives is going to raise alarms with federal regulators, and at the least, they’ll want to know what promises Musk can make to ensure Twitter’s security safeguards haven’t eroded.
Should Twitter be found in violation of the consent decree, Musk would face major fines akin to the $5 billion settlement that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg reached with the FTC in 2019 over alleged violations of user privacy data, Kovacic added.
“Not only will you have to write a big check, but you’ll see the imposition of further controls,” he said.
Twitter’s consent decree does not require its CEO to have to certify compliance, but the FTC could force Musk to personally file reports confirming that every facet of the agreement is being followed, just as Zuckerberg has had to do as part of Facebook’s settlement.
Musk “would get the Zuckerberg deal plus,” Kovacic said.
PP
- barkingmad
- Chief Pilot
- Posts: 5497
- Joined: Mon Nov 02, 2015 9:13 pm
- Location: Another Planet
- Gender:
- Age: 75
Re: Twitter
Seems as if Twatter is in a death spiral since the Musk wafted into their environment;
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/11/12/tho ... ious-risk/
A question for the social meeja eggspurts here;
“Has Twatter been a force for good or evil in the sunlit uplands of the 21st Century?”
Answers on a grain of rice, long grain brands are acceptable as media.
![Rolling on the floor =))](./images/smilies/24.gif)
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/11/12/tho ... ious-risk/
A question for the social meeja eggspurts here;
“Has Twatter been a force for good or evil in the sunlit uplands of the 21st Century?”
Answers on a grain of rice, long grain brands are acceptable as media.
![Ha ha :))](./images/smilies/21.gif)
![Rolling on the floor =))](./images/smilies/24.gif)
Re: Twitter
Elon Musk demands Twitter staff commit to 'long hours' or leave
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives and laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/ ... -rcna57455
New Twitter CEO and sole director Elon Musk sent a companywide email to remaining employees of the social media business on Wednesday, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to these conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public, or in the company’s internal Slack channels.
Since Musk took over on Oct. 28, he has announced sweeping changes planned for Twitter. One change that he insisted the company roll out quickly, called Twitter Blue verification, had to be rescinded, however.
The $7.99/month Blue subscription service allowed people to pay for a blue check mark that looked like the mark previously reserved to show an account was verified or official.
A deluge of impersonators bought the paid subscriber checkmarks to pose as legitimate celebrities, brands and politicians, and in some cases, they posted false information about companies.
For example, accounts impersonated the multinational drug company Eli Lilly. One impersonator caused a serious problem when they tweeted, “we are excited to announce insulin is free now.” The tweet remained on the social media platform for hours before it was taken down. The real Eli Lilly account later tweeted: “We apologize to those who have been served a misleading message from a fake Lilly account.”
Eli Lilly’s stock price dropped sharply after the false message was posted, and the company has decided to suspend advertising on Twitter indefinitely.
Musk now plans a revised Twitter Blue Verified release on Nov. 29th.
Here’s the full email that Elon Musk sent to Twitter employees on Wednesday (transcribed by CNBC):
From: Elon Musk
To: Team [at Twitter]
Subj. A Fork in the Road
Date: Nov. 16, 2022 [time stamp removed]
Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.
Twitter will also be much more engineering-driven. Design and product management will still be very important and report to me, but those writing great code will constitute the majority of our team and have the greatest sway.
At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company, so l think this makes sense.
If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below:
[Link removed]
Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance.
Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful.
Elon
PP
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives and laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/ ... -rcna57455
New Twitter CEO and sole director Elon Musk sent a companywide email to remaining employees of the social media business on Wednesday, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to these conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public, or in the company’s internal Slack channels.
Since Musk took over on Oct. 28, he has announced sweeping changes planned for Twitter. One change that he insisted the company roll out quickly, called Twitter Blue verification, had to be rescinded, however.
The $7.99/month Blue subscription service allowed people to pay for a blue check mark that looked like the mark previously reserved to show an account was verified or official.
A deluge of impersonators bought the paid subscriber checkmarks to pose as legitimate celebrities, brands and politicians, and in some cases, they posted false information about companies.
For example, accounts impersonated the multinational drug company Eli Lilly. One impersonator caused a serious problem when they tweeted, “we are excited to announce insulin is free now.” The tweet remained on the social media platform for hours before it was taken down. The real Eli Lilly account later tweeted: “We apologize to those who have been served a misleading message from a fake Lilly account.”
Eli Lilly’s stock price dropped sharply after the false message was posted, and the company has decided to suspend advertising on Twitter indefinitely.
Musk now plans a revised Twitter Blue Verified release on Nov. 29th.
Here’s the full email that Elon Musk sent to Twitter employees on Wednesday (transcribed by CNBC):
From: Elon Musk
To: Team [at Twitter]
Subj. A Fork in the Road
Date: Nov. 16, 2022 [time stamp removed]
Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.
Twitter will also be much more engineering-driven. Design and product management will still be very important and report to me, but those writing great code will constitute the majority of our team and have the greatest sway.
At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company, so l think this makes sense.
If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below:
[Link removed]
Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance.
Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful.
Elon
PP
- Fox3WheresMyBanana
- Chief Pilot
- Posts: 13248
- Joined: Thu Sep 03, 2015 9:51 pm
- Location: Great White North
- Gender:
- Age: 61
Re: Twitter
The "long hours" bit is just exploitation.
If he wants more work done, he can hire and train more people.
I'd leave.
Indeed, I have left other employment when I got this kind of rubbish.
And so did others.
And only one of the bosses issuing these kind of stupid orders lasted longer than a year, and she only lasted two.
In half the cases, the entire company folded within 3 years.
If he wants more work done, he can hire and train more people.
I'd leave.
Indeed, I have left other employment when I got this kind of rubbish.
And so did others.
And only one of the bosses issuing these kind of stupid orders lasted longer than a year, and she only lasted two.
In half the cases, the entire company folded within 3 years.
Re: Twitter
I can't wait to see some fed up techie leave a digital timebomb on their way out the door.
PP
![Devil :ymdevil:](./images/smilies/19.gif)
PP
Re: Twitter
It's all kicking off this evening.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/17/tech ... k-ftc.html
It appears that a significant number of employees decided to take him up on the three months' severance package.
According to posts on Twitter (oh, the irony), about an hour ago Twitter has alerted employees that all office buildings are temporarily closed and badge access is suspended. This is supposedly because Musk is indeed terrified that someone will indeed leave a digital timebomb on the way out.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/17/tech ... k-ftc.html
It appears that a significant number of employees decided to take him up on the three months' severance package.
According to posts on Twitter (oh, the irony), about an hour ago Twitter has alerted employees that all office buildings are temporarily closed and badge access is suspended. This is supposedly because Musk is indeed terrified that someone will indeed leave a digital timebomb on the way out.
- Fox3WheresMyBanana
- Chief Pilot
- Posts: 13248
- Joined: Thu Sep 03, 2015 9:51 pm
- Location: Great White North
- Gender:
- Age: 61
Re: Twitter
Article is paywalled, Llondel.
This happened at Meta
Meta Employees, Security Guards Fired for Hijacking User Accounts
Some workers allegedly accepted thousands of dollars in bribes
This happened at Meta
Meta Employees, Security Guards Fired for Hijacking User Accounts
Some workers allegedly accepted thousands of dollars in bribes
Re: Twitter
Elon Musk’s rapid changes at Twitter could raise legal concerns, experts say
Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500-person payroll and slashed the number of contractors.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/el ... -rcna57549
As Elon Musk continues his swift and sweeping changes across Twitter — including mass layoffs and requiring remaining employees to commit to "long hours” or leave — lawyers and employment experts said his demands could open up the billionaire and his company to a number of legal issues.
In a companywide ultimatum sent Wednesday morning, Twitter gave employees a deadline of 5 p.m. on Thursday to decide if they want to stay, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to the conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”
It was the latest in a number of broad changes Musk has announced since he took over Twitter on Oct. 28.
Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500-person payroll, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public or in the company’s internal Slack channels.
Twitter did not immediately respond to request for comment on potential legal concerns.
Musk has defended defended his decision-making in posts on Twitter, saying about the widespread layoffs, “unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day” and that the company offered a severance package that is "50% more than legally required.”
Some employment experts said the drastic changes could raise issues with state and federal labor laws. 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. The lawsuit, filed earlier this month, alleges that the social media company ran afoul of the act, which requires 60 days’ notice of mass layoffs, and also that Twitter reneged on an agreement that entitled employees to the same severance and benefits they previously received. Twitter has not yet responded to the lawsuit, according to court documents.
Liss-Riordan previously sued Tesla over layoffs in June. A Texas judge in the Tesla case recently said workers must pursue their claims via closed-door arbitration instead.
“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.
But Rafael Nendel‑Flores, a member of the Clark Hill law firm in California, said that it was “hard to conclude that Twitter definitely did violate the WARN Act because they may have done things to mitigate against it.”
Nendel‑Flores said the only remedies available under the WARN Act are 60 days of pay and benefits, and if an employee ends up getting those 60 days of pay and benefits, the situation could be seen as “kind of like no harm, no foul.”
But there could be other legal concerns for Twitter, including under laws that protect against discrimination, Liss-Riordan and Nendel‑Flores said.
Liss-Riordan said she has also been fielding calls from others with concerns regarding discrimination of protected categories of employees such as women, people of color and people with disabilities.
Regarding the email from Musk giving people a deadline of 5 p.m. Thursday to stay or leave Twitter, she said there could be employees who were “in a very tenuous legal situation.”
“There are people who are out on disability leave or maybe going out on disability leave, there are pregnant workers. There are all kinds of questions coming up about how people are supposed to respond to this,” she said. “We’re fielding questions and giving advice now as people are trying to make a decision about what to do here.”
Nendel‑Flores said the order could also raise concerns about age discrimination.
“If you’re doing a layoff of two or more people who are over 40, there are certain disclosures that have to be provided to them in order for them to release their age discrimination claims under under federal law and we don’t know if Twitter did that either,” he said. “The logic there is that someone over 40 can make a knowing decision as to whether or not to sign the severance agreement.”
“When you’re laying off thousands of people, you’re certainly going to have a significant number of people who are over 40,” he said, but added more details are needed to know for certain.
Some employees could make a case that Musk and the company retaliated against them for critical comments they made about him.
“There are multiple statutes that protect your employees if they’re engaging in what’s called protected activity,” Nendel‑Flores said.
“That basically prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for complaining about issues that are tethered to public policy, i.e. statutes or regulations,” he said. “So, the line of demarcation is, if someone just says, ‘I don’t like Elon Musk, and I think it sucks that he took over my company,’ that’s probably not protected. But if someone says, ‘I think what Elon Musk is doing is unlawful or discriminatory’ and then Elon and Twitter fire those people, then that creates potential issues.”
“If Twitter fires someone for saying that, that’s problematic, and that could lead to retaliation complaints,” he said.
But, as all of the details of Twitter’s actions still remain unclear, Nendel‑Flores said “the devil is in the details” as to what, if any, legal issues the company could face.
Twitter employees who do pursue legal action in California could benefit from "employee friendly protections" in that state, Nendel‑Flores said.
“So, there are a lot of issues that can be raised with things that he’s doing and sometimes employers don’t even realize that they’re kind of stepping into those issues,” he said.
California's labor laws are much more robust than, for example, those in Texas, where Musk moved the Tesla headquarters.
“That’s a much different place" with fewer employee protections at the state level, he said, adding that in California "it really is a different universe out here from the labor and employment perspective.”
As far as requiring employees to work longer hours, Daniela Urban, the executive director of the Center for Workers’ Rights in California, said that especially for salaried employees, "companies are allowed to increase their workload" and "there are no universal legal protections for increased workload demand."
Urban said that as long as employers are paying employees properly, upholding safe working conditions and not discriminating against their workers, “the determination about what and how they do their work is largely left to the employer.”
“There are far fewer protections about how the job can change while still employed,” she said. “Workloads can change and even job duties can change absent having a collective bargaining agreement, or any other kind of contract.”
PP
Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500-person payroll and slashed the number of contractors.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/el ... -rcna57549
As Elon Musk continues his swift and sweeping changes across Twitter — including mass layoffs and requiring remaining employees to commit to "long hours” or leave — lawyers and employment experts said his demands could open up the billionaire and his company to a number of legal issues.
In a companywide ultimatum sent Wednesday morning, Twitter gave employees a deadline of 5 p.m. on Thursday to decide if they want to stay, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to the conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”
It was the latest in a number of broad changes Musk has announced since he took over Twitter on Oct. 28.
Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500-person payroll, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public or in the company’s internal Slack channels.
Twitter did not immediately respond to request for comment on potential legal concerns.
Musk has defended defended his decision-making in posts on Twitter, saying about the widespread layoffs, “unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day” and that the company offered a severance package that is "50% more than legally required.”
Some employment experts said the drastic changes could raise issues with state and federal labor laws. 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. The lawsuit, filed earlier this month, alleges that the social media company ran afoul of the act, which requires 60 days’ notice of mass layoffs, and also that Twitter reneged on an agreement that entitled employees to the same severance and benefits they previously received. Twitter has not yet responded to the lawsuit, according to court documents.
Liss-Riordan previously sued Tesla over layoffs in June. A Texas judge in the Tesla case recently said workers must pursue their claims via closed-door arbitration instead.
“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.
But Rafael Nendel‑Flores, a member of the Clark Hill law firm in California, said that it was “hard to conclude that Twitter definitely did violate the WARN Act because they may have done things to mitigate against it.”
Nendel‑Flores said the only remedies available under the WARN Act are 60 days of pay and benefits, and if an employee ends up getting those 60 days of pay and benefits, the situation could be seen as “kind of like no harm, no foul.”
But there could be other legal concerns for Twitter, including under laws that protect against discrimination, Liss-Riordan and Nendel‑Flores said.
Liss-Riordan said she has also been fielding calls from others with concerns regarding discrimination of protected categories of employees such as women, people of color and people with disabilities.
Regarding the email from Musk giving people a deadline of 5 p.m. Thursday to stay or leave Twitter, she said there could be employees who were “in a very tenuous legal situation.”
“There are people who are out on disability leave or maybe going out on disability leave, there are pregnant workers. There are all kinds of questions coming up about how people are supposed to respond to this,” she said. “We’re fielding questions and giving advice now as people are trying to make a decision about what to do here.”
Nendel‑Flores said the order could also raise concerns about age discrimination.
“If you’re doing a layoff of two or more people who are over 40, there are certain disclosures that have to be provided to them in order for them to release their age discrimination claims under under federal law and we don’t know if Twitter did that either,” he said. “The logic there is that someone over 40 can make a knowing decision as to whether or not to sign the severance agreement.”
“When you’re laying off thousands of people, you’re certainly going to have a significant number of people who are over 40,” he said, but added more details are needed to know for certain.
Some employees could make a case that Musk and the company retaliated against them for critical comments they made about him.
“There are multiple statutes that protect your employees if they’re engaging in what’s called protected activity,” Nendel‑Flores said.
“That basically prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for complaining about issues that are tethered to public policy, i.e. statutes or regulations,” he said. “So, the line of demarcation is, if someone just says, ‘I don’t like Elon Musk, and I think it sucks that he took over my company,’ that’s probably not protected. But if someone says, ‘I think what Elon Musk is doing is unlawful or discriminatory’ and then Elon and Twitter fire those people, then that creates potential issues.”
“If Twitter fires someone for saying that, that’s problematic, and that could lead to retaliation complaints,” he said.
But, as all of the details of Twitter’s actions still remain unclear, Nendel‑Flores said “the devil is in the details” as to what, if any, legal issues the company could face.
Twitter employees who do pursue legal action in California could benefit from "employee friendly protections" in that state, Nendel‑Flores said.
“So, there are a lot of issues that can be raised with things that he’s doing and sometimes employers don’t even realize that they’re kind of stepping into those issues,” he said.
California's labor laws are much more robust than, for example, those in Texas, where Musk moved the Tesla headquarters.
“That’s a much different place" with fewer employee protections at the state level, he said, adding that in California "it really is a different universe out here from the labor and employment perspective.”
As far as requiring employees to work longer hours, Daniela Urban, the executive director of the Center for Workers’ Rights in California, said that especially for salaried employees, "companies are allowed to increase their workload" and "there are no universal legal protections for increased workload demand."
Urban said that as long as employers are paying employees properly, upholding safe working conditions and not discriminating against their workers, “the determination about what and how they do their work is largely left to the employer.”
“There are far fewer protections about how the job can change while still employed,” she said. “Workloads can change and even job duties can change absent having a collective bargaining agreement, or any other kind of contract.”
PP
Re: Twitter
Interesting, it wasn't paywalled for me. I don't give them money and they don't seem to block my access.Fox3WheresMyBanana wrote: ↑Fri Nov 18, 2022 1:12 amArticle is paywalled, Llondel.
This happened at Meta
Meta Employees, Security Guards Fired for Hijacking User Accounts
Some workers allegedly accepted thousands of dollars in bribes
I think I summarised the highlights, Musk and his team blocked everyone from the buildings, including themselves, allegedly, and said it'll be back open on Monday, presumably for those who still work there. Elsewhere it is claimed that several critical bits of the infrastructure are not staffed, because everyone associated with those departments quit.
So at this moment it looks like it'll keep working until something breaks, and then who knows what'll happen?
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Re: Twitter
You have to ask, are Elon Musk and Liz Truss in a competition to see who can screw up the quickest ![Surprise :-o](./images/smilies/13.gif)
![Surprise :-o](./images/smilies/13.gif)
When all else fails, read the instructions.
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He's not the Messiah, he's just a very silly multi-billionaire!
If Musk is only keeping the "best people" then he surely must stand down himself. His response is lame however, because under such duress, it is generally the best people who leave because they are confident that they will get another job.Nov 17 (Reuters) - Hundreds of Twitter employees are estimated to be leaving the beleaguered social media company following an ultimatum from new owner Elon Musk that staffers sign up for "long hours at high intensity," or leave.
In a poll on the workplace app Blind, which verifies employees through their work email addresses and allows them to share information anonymously, 42% of 180 people chose the answer for "Taking exit option, I'm free!"
A quarter said they had chosen to stay "reluctantly," and only 7% of the poll participants said they "clicked yes to stay, I'm hardcore."
Musk was meeting some top employees to try and convince them to stay, said one current employee and a recently departed employee who is in touch with Twitter colleagues.
While it is unclear how many employees have chosen to stay, the numbers highlight the reluctance of some staffers to remain at a company where Musk has hastened to fire half its employees including top management, and is ruthlessly changing the culture to emphasize long hours and an intense pace.
The company notified employees that it will close its offices and cut badge access until Monday, according to two sources. Security officers have begun kicking employees out of the office on Thursday evening, one source said.
Musk took to Twitter late on Thursday and said that he was not worried about resignations as "the best people are staying."
I can't see many serious corporates wanting to be associated with this shitshow! Musk has just damaged two critical conduits to success, advertising revenue and adequacy of skilled resource.
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Re: Twitter
Says all that needs to said really...
https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/28/234 ... moderation
.You f@ck!d up real good, kiddo.
Twitter is a disaster clown car company that is successful despite itself, and there is no possible way to grow users and revenue without making a series of enormous compromises that will ultimately destroy your reputation and possibly cause grievous damage to your other companies.
I say this with utter confidence because the problems with Twitter are not engineering problems. They are political problems. Twitter, the company, makes very little interesting technology; the tech stack is not the valuable asset. The asset is the user base: hopelessly addicted politicians, reporters, celebrities, and other people who should know better but keep posting anyway. You! You, Elon Musk, are addicted to Twitter. You’re the asset. You just bought yourself for $44 billion dollars.
The problem when the asset is people is that people are intensely complicated and trying to regulate how people behave is historically a miserable experience, especially when that authority is vested in a single powerful individual.
What I mean is that you are now the King of Twitter, and people think that you, personally, are responsible for everything that happens on Twitter now. It also turns out that absolute monarchs usually get murdered when ***** goes sideways.
Here are some examples: you can write as many polite letters to advertisers as you want, but you cannot reasonably expect to collect any meaningful advertising revenue if you do not promise those advertisers “brand safety.” That means you have to ban racism, sexism, transphobia, and all kinds of other speech that is totally legal in the United States but reveals people to be total assholes. So you can make all the promises about “free speech” you want, but the dull reality is that you still have to ban a bunch of legal speech if you want to make money. And when you start doing that, your creepy new right-wing fanboys are going to viciously turn on you, just like they turn on every other social network that realizes the same essential truth.
Actually, there’s a step before trying to get the ad money: it turns out that most people do not want to participate in horrible unmoderated internet spaces full of **** racists and not-all-men fedora bullies. (This is why Twitter is so small compared to its peers!) What most people want from social media is to have nice experiences and to feel validated all the time. They want to live at Disney World. So, if you want more people to join Twitter and actually post tweets, you have to make the experience much, much more pleasant. Which means moderating more aggressively! Again, every “alternative” social network has learned this lesson the hard way. Like, over and over and over again.
Also, everyone crying about “free speech” conveniently ignores that the biggest threat to free speech in America is the **** government, which seems completely bored of the First Amendment. They’re out here banning books, Elon! President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump have identical policy positions on Section 230: they both want to repeal it. Do you know why? Because the First Amendment prohibits them from making explicit speech regulations, so they keep threatening to repeal the law that allows social networks to even exist in order to exert indirect pressure on content policy. It’s not subtle!
State governments are even less subtle: both Texas and Florida have passed speech regulations that overtly tell social media companies how to moderate, in open hostility to the First Amendment. Figuring out how to comply with these laws is not an engineering problem (not least because compliance might be impossible). It is a legal problem because these laws are blatantly unconstitutional, and the only appropriate response to them is to tell the government to shut up and go away. (A big problem here is that the courts are pretty stupid about the internet!) A challenge to these laws, partially funded by Twitter, is headed to the Supreme Court, which is the polar opposite of a predictable system: it is a group of uncool weirdos with lifetime appointments that can radically reshape American life however it wants.
You can’t deploy AI at this problem: you have to go out and defend the actual First Amendment against the bad laws in Texas and Florida, whose taxes you like and whose governors you seem pretty fond of. Are you ready for what that looks like? Are you ready to sit before Congress and politely decline to engage in their content capture sessions for hours on end? Are you ready to do any of this without the incredibly respected policy experts whose leader you first harassed and then fired? This is what you signed up for. It’s way more boring than rockets, cars, and rockets with cars on them.
And it gets worse the second you leave the United States! Germany is a huge market for Tesla. Are you going to flout Germany’s speech laws? I would bet not. The Indian government basically demands social media companies provide potential hostages in order to operate in that country; you can’t engineer your way out of that *****. Are you ready to experience the pressure Twitter faces in the Middle East to block and restrict accounts? Are you ready for the fact that the Iranian government will **** murder people over their social media posts? (Are you ready for how Twitter is being used by Iranians protesting that government right now?) Are you excited for the Chinese government to find ways to threaten Tesla’s huge business in that country over content that appears on Twitter? Because it’s going to happen.
The essential truth of every social network is that the product is content moderation, and everyone hates the people who decide how content moderation works. Content moderation is what Twitter makes — it is the thing that defines the user experience. It’s what YouTube makes, it’s what Instagram makes, it’s what TikTok makes. They all try to incentivize good stuff, disincentivize bad stuff, and delete the really bad stuff. Do you know why YouTube videos are all eight to 10 minutes long? Because that’s how long a video has to be to qualify for a second ad slot in the middle. That’s content moderation, baby — YouTube wants a certain kind of video, and it created incentives to get it. That’s the business you’re in now. The longer you fight it or pretend that you can sell something else, the more Twitter will drag you into the deepest possible muck of defending indefensible speech. And if you turn on a dime and accept that growth requires aggressive content moderation and pushing back against government speech regulations around the country and world, well, we’ll see how your fans react to that
https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/28/234 ... moderation
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Re: Twitter
Excellent!
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Is Musk a Space Karen?
The Verge?We’ll say this: If Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter produces nothing of any value—and gosh, but is that an “if” that feels like an increasingly solid bet as every new day ticks by—at least it will produce one image that will live on for years in our mind’s eye: A scrolling set of insults, including “dictator’s asskisser,” “mediocre manchild,” and, most beautifully, “space Karen,” projected on the side of the social media company’s headquarters tonight. Said building, of course, is currently shuttered, amidst the company’s latest “mass exodus” of employees in the span of a handful of weeks
Space Karen!
![Rolling on the floor =))](./images/smilies/24.gif)
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Re: Twitter
Mostly excellent.
The fifth para about Section 230 is logically inconsistent with the third para about censorship by Twitter.
And Twitter headed to the Supreme Court is two groups of uncool weirdos ;)
The last sentence is somewhat confused - Twitter has to content moderate, but not the content moderation the government wants. These are both against the First Amendment, not just one of them.
The fifth para about Section 230 is logically inconsistent with the third para about censorship by Twitter.
And Twitter headed to the Supreme Court is two groups of uncool weirdos ;)
The last sentence is somewhat confused - Twitter has to content moderate, but not the content moderation the government wants. These are both against the First Amendment, not just one of them.
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Re: Is Musk a Space Karen?
TheGreenAnger wrote: ↑Fri Nov 18, 2022 12:54 pmThe Verge?We’ll say this: If Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter produces nothing of any value—and gosh, but is that an “if” that feels like an increasingly solid bet as every new day ticks by—at least it will produce one image that will live on for years in our mind’s eye: A scrolling set of insults, including “dictator’s asskisser,” “mediocre manchild,” and, most beautifully, “space Karen,” projected on the side of the social media company’s headquarters tonight. Said building, of course, is currently shuttered, amidst the company’s latest “mass exodus” of employees in the span of a handful of weeks
https://www.themarysue.com/why-is-elon- ... explained/Elon Musk Will Forevermore be Known as ‘Space Karen.’ Here’s How It Started.
So Elon Musk is Space Karen now? Yes, you read that right.
If you were on Twitter Thursday night, hoo boy—after the news that hundreds of remaining Twitter employees had quit and headquarters was shut down, the whole place had the feel of a rave taking place on a spaceship careening toward the sun. Everyone knows they’re going to going to be engulfed in flames, but no one knows when exactly it’s going to happen, so all the partiers just running around blurting out their secrets and trying to find out who has crushes on them.
It was epic. I have a hangover and all I did was scroll social media for awhile.
Meanwhile, in San Francisco, some anonymous hero used a projector to plaster a series of messages onto the outside of the Twitter HQ building.
The message says “Elon Musk,” and then scrolls through a series of epithets: bankruptcy baby, supreme parasite, petulant pimple, apartheid profiteer, dictator’s asskisser, lawless oligarch, insecure colonizer, cruel hoarder, space Karen, mediocre manchild, pressurized privilege, petty racist, megalomaniac, and worthless billionaire.
They’re all pretty great burns, but “Space Karen” is the one that has captured the imaginations of the entire Internet. Someone has already photoshopped a head of coifed blond hair onto
A tweet showing two portraits of Elon Musk with styled blond hair.
Apologies if Twitter has gone dark by the time you read this, and the tweet above has disappeared.
Why Space Karen? The word “Karen” originally meant a white woman leveraging her privilege to hurt and belittle people of color, whether it was by calling the police on a Black man or demanding to speak to a service worker’s manager. Now it’s kind of morphed into any obnoxious white woman (which, yeah, allows white men to use it in a straight-up misogynist way—for example, one guy tried to make “Librarian Karen” a thing when a librarian wouldn’t let him in the library without a mask). So the implication is that Musk is acting entitled, selfish, and high on his own power trip.
And the space part? Well, remember that Elon thinks he’s going to colonize Mars. Or does he still think that? I can’t keep up with this guy’s whims.
Anyway, there you have it—if you’re wondering where Space Karen came from, it’s the brainchild of someone in the California Bay Area with a projector, beef against Elon, and a lot of imagination.
A perfect moniker for the odious, egocentric sociopath.
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Re: Twitter
Quite a few of the Tweeters I have been using for info about the Ukraine war have got themselves a Mastodon account in the last 24 hours.
I am presuming this is just precautionary at the moment.
I am presuming this is just precautionary at the moment.
Re: Twitter
I've heard that many are switching to Mastodon over here as well.Fox3WheresMyBanana wrote: ↑Sat Nov 19, 2022 5:52 pmQuite a few of the Tweeters I have been using for info about the Ukraine war have got themselves a Mastodon account in the last 24 hours.
I am presuming this is just precautionary at the moment.
Won't bother me as I don't do Twitter except to watch them on here.
I would assume that Mastodon would work the same way.
![Hmm... :-?](./images/smilies/39.gif)
PP