Elon Musk says he fired engineer who corrected him on Twitter
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Several people have called out Muskâs tweet about Twitterâs poor performance. One of them seems to have given up their job by doing so.
By Mitchell Clark
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Twitter has seen thousands of layoffs, departures, and resignations since Elon Musk took over, but one of the latest staffing changes appears to have been personal â the companyâs new CEO tweeted that Eric Frohnhoefer, an employee who had publicly argued with him on the platform, had been fired .
The saga started on Sunday, when Musk tweeted an apology for Twitter being slow in âmany countriesâ and implied that the poor performance is because the app does over 1,000 âpoorly batchedâ remote procedure calls to load the home timeline â basically saying the app has to reach out to other servers a bunch of times and wait for a response for each request. Frohnhoefer, who tweeted that heâs spent six years working on Twitter for Android, quote retweeted Muskâs statement saying it was incorrect. Musk has done the same thing several times in response to news stories about his companies , but unlike those instances, Frohnhoefer actually went on to provide an explanation for why he thought his bossâs tweet was incorrect.
According to Frohnhoefer, Twitter actually makes zero remote procedure calls , or RPCs. Instead, he says, when the app starts up, it makes around 20 background requests. Seemingly to clarify his original tweet, Musk then responded , âThe fact that you donât realize that there are up to 1200 âmicroservicesâ being called when someone uses the Twitter app is not great.â Frohnhoefer disagreed again, tweeting that the ânumber required to generate the home timeline is closer to 200 than 1200.â
The conversation between Musk and Frohnhoefer is messy, spread over many threads and hours (which Twitter ironically makes difficult to see and follow ). At one point, Musk asked Frohnhoefer what he had personally done to fix Twitter being slow on Android â though remember that the conversation started with Muskâs apology for it being slow in âmany countriesâ â not on Android. But Muskâs seemingly final word on it came in response to a discussion on whether Frohnhoefer shouldâve brought his concerns about the original tweet up in private on Slack rather than publicly calling Musk out. A commenter in the thread said that Musk probably doesnât want Frohnhoefer on his team after the developer tweeted that Musk shouldâve asked questions about the slowness issues privately, to which Musk replied , âHeâs fired.â
Frohnhoefer didnât immediately respond to The Verge âs request for comment on whether heâd been contacted by Twitterâs HR team or had heard any word other than Muskâs tweet. (It is worth noting that if you have a public spat with Musk, your DMs, email, and mentions will generally turn into a mess.) He told Forbes that it took Twitter around five hours to lock him out of his company computer , but that he hadnât heard any formal information about his firing from the company.
Weâve also tweeted at Musk for comment, as Twitter no longer has a communications department.
Musk has received pushback from others about his tweet, including from other Twitter employees. Sasha Solomon, who identifies herself as a Twitter tech lead, quote retweeted it , saying, âYou did not just layoff almost all of infra and then make some sassy remark about how we do batching.â She also accused Musk of not learning about how GraphQL works and not knowing how Twitterâs infrastructure works.
On Monday evening, Solomon tweeted âlol just got fired for shitposting.â Her thread doesnât mention whether she was fired by Musk directly, and he doesnât appear to have responded to her tweets criticizing him like he did with Frohnhoefer.
Commenters outside the company have also called the tweet into question . Musk says he got the info about the RPCs from several Twitter engineers and said that âthe ex-employee is wrong.â
If Musk was indeed wrong about how Twitter operates, it wouldnât be the first time. On Sunday, he tweeted that the site is the âbiggest click driver on the Internet by far,â a statement that was immediately dunked on by almost everyone who owns a website and knows how powerful Google and Facebook are. Twitter users also used Birdwatch, a feature that lets you point out misinformation on the site , to correct Musk . (It was also not the first time heâd been Birdwatched â thereâs also a correction note under his tweet about the price of insulin .) He later deleted the tweet .
As for the fallout of the spat, Musk has announced that at least one feature , the labels saying which device or app a tweet was posted from, will be cut in the name of performance. So far, Musk hasnât replied to the other suggestions Frohnhoefer made about improving performance, which include cutting down on unnecessary features and reworking systems that are holding the app back.
As for Frohnhoefer himself, heâs tweeted that it was âdefinitely stupidâ to confront Musk the way he did, though he doesnât seem too concerned about being fired. Heâs already been encouraged to apply for jobs at other companies .
Update November 14th, 7:13PM ET: Added info about Frohnhoefer not having been contacted by Twitterâs HR team since being fired.
Update November 14th, 7:51PM ET: Added news that another person who had criticized Musk was fired.
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Twitter / Tech / Elon Musk. Several people have called out Muskâs tweet about Twitterâs poor performance. One of them seems to have given up their job by doing so. By Mitchell Clark. Share this story. Twitter has seen thousands of layoffs, departures, and resignations since Elon Musk took over, but one of the latest staffing changes appears to have been personal â the companyâs new CEO tweeted that Eric Frohnhoefer, an employee who had publicly argued with him on the platform, had been fired . The saga started on Sunday, when Musk tweeted an apology for Twitter being slow in âmany countriesâ and implied that the poor performance is because the app does over 1,000 âpoorly batchedâ remote procedure calls to load the home timeline â basically saying the app has to reach out to other servers a bunch of times and wait for a response for each request. Frohnhoefer, who tweeted that heâs spent six years working on Twitter for Android, quote retweeted Muskâs statement saying it was incorrect. Musk has done the same thing several times in response to news stories about his companies , but unlike those instances, Frohnhoefer actually went on to provide an explanation for why he thought his bossâs tweet was incorrect. According to Frohnhoefer, Twitter actually makes zero remote procedure calls , or RPCs. Instead, he says, when the app starts up, it makes around 20 background requests. Seemingly to clarify his original tweet, Musk then responded , âThe fact that you donât realize that there are up to 1200 âmicroservicesâ being called when someone uses the Twitter app is not great.â Frohnhoefer disagreed again, tweeting that the ânumber required to generate the home timeline is closer to 200 than 1200.â The conversation between Musk and Frohnhoefer is messy, spread over many threads and hours (which Twitter ironically makes difficult to see and follow ). At one point, Musk asked Frohnhoefer what he had personally done to fix Twitter being slow on Android â though remember that the conversation started with Muskâs apology for it being slow in âmany countriesâ â not on Android. But Muskâs seemingly final word on it came in response to a discussion on whether Frohnhoefer shouldâve brought his concerns about the original tweet up in private on Slack rather than publicly calling Musk out. A commenter in the thread said that Musk probably doesnât want Frohnhoefer on his team after the developer tweeted that Musk shouldâve asked questions about the slowness issues privately, to which Musk replied , âHeâs fired.â Frohnhoefer didnât immediately respond to The Verge âs request for comment on whether heâd been contacted by Twitterâs HR team or had heard any word other than Muskâs tweet. (It is worth noting that if you have a public spat with Musk, your DMs, email, and mentions will generally turn into a mess.) He told Forbes that it took Twitter around five hours to lock him out of his company computer , but that he hadnât heard any formal information about his firing from the company. Weâve also tweeted at Musk for comment, as Twitter no longer has a communications department. Musk has received pushback from others about his tweet, including from other Twitter employees. Sasha Solomon, who identifies herself as a Twitter tech lead, quote retweeted it , saying, âYou did not just layoff almost all of infra and then make some sassy remark about how we do batching.â She also accused Musk of not learning about how GraphQL works and not knowing how Twitterâs infrastructure works. On Monday evening, Solomon tweeted âlol just got fired for shitposting.â Her thread doesnât mention whether she was fired by Musk directly, and he doesnât appear to have responded to her tweets criticizing him like he did with Frohnhoefer. Commenters outside the company have also called the tweet into question . Musk says he got the info about the RPCs from several Twitter engineers and said that âthe ex-employee is wrong.â If Musk was indeed wrong about how Twitter operates, it wouldnât be the first time. On Sunday, he tweeted that the site is the âbiggest click driver on the Internet by far,â a statement that was immediately dunked on by almost everyone who owns a website and knows how powerful Google and Facebook are. Twitter users also used Birdwatch, a feature that lets you point out misinformation on the site , to correct Musk . (It was also not the first time heâd been Birdwatched â thereâs also a correction note under his tweet about the price of insulin .) He later deleted the tweet . As for the fallout of the spat, Musk has announced that at least one feature , the labels saying which device or app a tweet was posted from, will be cut in the name of performance. So far, Musk hasnât replied to the other suggestions Frohnhoefer made about improving performance, which include cutting down on unnecessary features and reworking systems that are holding the app back. As for Frohnhoefer himself, heâs tweeted that it was âdefinitely stupidâ to confront Musk the way he did, though he doesnât seem too concerned about being fired. Heâs already been encouraged to apply for jobs at other companies . Update November 14th, 7:13PM ET: Added info about Frohnhoefer not having been contacted by Twitterâs HR team since being fired. Update November 14th, 7:51PM ET: Added news that another person who had criticized Musk was fired. Amazon mass layoffs will reportedly ax 10,000 people this week. Amazon mass layoffs will reportedly ax 10,000 people this week. Inside Elon Muskâs first meeting with Twitter employees. Inside Elon Muskâs first meeting with Twitter employees. Hereâs why Elizabeth Holmes thinks she shouldnât go to prison. Hereâs why Elizabeth Holmes thinks she shouldnât go to prison. Meta Quest Pro review: get me out of here. Meta Quest Pro review: get me out of here. Verge Deals. / Sign up for Verge Deals to get deals on products we've tested sent to your inbox daily.