Elon Musk the fire engineer who broke the bad news about Twitter engagement: report

Twitter accounts with large followings have reported little engagement on the social media platform in recent months, a problem that CEO Elon Musk said he would investigate and report back to users. According to a new report from tech news site Platformer, it looks like Musk didn’t get the answers he wanted, even firing an engineer who gave the billionaire bad news about an engagement on the site. Was given

“They screwed up the algorithm on @Twitter so much that everyone is completely invisible and engagement is almost nonexistent. It’s almost not worth being here anymore,” tweeted conservative commenter Catturd2 at the end of last month,

“It shouldn’t be hard. F–king remove the algorithm and Shadowbane so we can see each other!” Catturd2 continued.

According to Platformer, Musk reportedly gathered engineers into a meeting on Tuesday to address the issue, and Musk described the problem as “ridiculous” and asked what was going on.

Musk reportedly said, “I have over 100 million followers, and I’m only getting thousands of impressions.”

But the engineers didn’t know what to tell him. They clearly looked at the data and couldn’t find any technical reason why engagement was down for the larger accounts. A senior engineer said perhaps people are tired of the constant drama that surrounded Musk in the first two months of his ownership of Twitter. Musk bought the company for $44 billion in late October 2022 and made news every day during those turbulent times—whether he was laying off thousands of employees, bringing some back after they felt they were needed Trying to persuade, or even viciously prod someone on The Dave Chappelle Comedy Show by the Bay Area Crowd.

According to the platformer, the engineers also showed how Musk’s name had fallen in Google Trends rankings, which peaked last year, and is now declining as the public is tired of the billionaire’s antics. But Musk was not happy with that response. It should be algorithmic. And any other explanation was unacceptable.

Musk, who seemingly wants a little more in life than being liked by millions of fans, chose to shoot the messenger rather than face an unpleasant truth, firing the engineer on the spot, according to the platformer. Gave.

Perhaps the Twitter staff will learn their lesson. You can bet the next person Musk asks a question will please the CEO, even if it’s a lie. His work seems to depend on it.