‘A profound sense of loss’: Inside Elon Musk’s Twitter culture teardown
By 
Aly McDevitt2022-12-05T14:52:00
When Elon Musk took over Twitter, he lit a match. The social media giant went up in flames as mass layoffs wiped out entire teams and impacted the lives of thousands of employees, internally known as Tweeps.
“It’s total chaos,” said former Twitter software engineer Eric Frohnhoefer. Frohnhoefer worked at the company for eight years before Musk fired him in a tweet. Why? Frohnhoefer publicly challenged him.
The software engineer wasn’t trying to get himself fired. It wasn’t a moral issue Frohnhoefer spoke out against; it was a technical one, the substance of which he understood deeply.
Didn’t matter. He was out of a job.
THIS IS MEMBERS-ONLY CONTENT
You are not logged in and do not have access to members-only content.
If you are already a registered user or a member, SIGN IN now.
Related articles
-
PremiumShould Tesla board, compliance rein in Musk? Expert says tech tycoon ‘doubly untouchable’
Tesla’s chief executive Elon Musk has admitted he’s leading his businesses “with great difficulty” while serving as President Trump’s senior adviser. The carmaker’s shareholders are openly questioning his bandwidth. Why isn’t Tesla’s board firing him? He’s “doubly untouchable,” a corporate governance expert says.
-
News BriefMusk sued by SEC for failing to disclose Twitter stock purchases quickly enough
Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person and the apparent right-hand man of incoming U.S. president Donald Trump, has been taken to court for a third time by the Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly violating securities law.
-
ArticleIrish DPC probing Twitter over breach affecting 5.4M users
The Irish Data Protection Commission is investigating whether Twitter violated the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation regarding a data breach alleged to have affected 5.4 million users.
More from Opinion
-
ArticleTech and compliance 2026: What to watch for in AI, cybersecurity and quantum computing
What will be the critical tech issues for compliance in 2026? We asked experts what tech, digital, and cyber issues they believe compliance teams should be focusing on in the year ahead.
-
ArticleTips for making AI tools more compliant in 2026
AI mistakes can lead to viral news stories and, sometimes, big legal bills. How can compliance managers learn from past mishaps and protect their organizations as AI becomes increasingly integrated into every part of our working lives? We asked experts what compliance should do to make sure AI toes the ...
-
ArticleTop of mind compliance topics in 2026: Finance, immigration, supply chains and sustainability
What will you be doing in the coming year? We asked experts in a range of sectors to gaze into their crystal balls and highlight one legal development or compliance topic that will be critical for compliance teams in 2026. This is an edited version of what they told us.