Elon Musk has halted remote working for Twitter workers, warning the firm to brace itself for “tough times ahead” in his first memo to employees as CEO.
The email, which was received late last night, warned that there was “no sugarcoating” the economic prognosis.
He believes that a firm that relies on advertising, such as Twitter, will suffer as a result of the negative outlook.
In the email, he also declared that working from home would be prohibited, with employees expected to work at least 40 hours each week.
The hours are subject to conditions agreed by him as Twitter’s new CEO.
It is his latest warning to his new employees, coming just days after he fired nearly half of the company’s worldwide workforce of approximately 7,500 people.
Musk’s decision to end remote working comes after Twitter had agreed to a permanent agreement that allowed employees to work from anywhere.
The new Twitter CEO is against working from home and will only give exceptions on a case-by-case basis.
Billionaire Musk has also removed ‘days of relaxation’ from the schedules of Twitter employees. This was a monthly, company-wide day off implemented during the epidemic.
Since taking over as CEO of Twitter over two weeks ago, Musk has implemented a slew of changes.
He is also pushing for users to pay $8 a month for ‘blue tick’ verification on Twitter, and stated in an email to workers last night that he wants subscriptions to account for half of the social media site’s revenue.
According to a separate email, Musk is also working on identifying and suspending any verified bots, trolls, and spam over the next several days.
His move to end remote working for Twitter employees came only hours after he scrapped the new gray ‘Official’ designation, which he says was ‘another method of establishing a two-class society.’
The badge was intended for high-profile accounts like media outlets and celebrities, but Musk ‘killed it’ just hours after it was released on Wednesday morning.
Along with being ‘an aesthetic nightmare,’ Musk added during a live Town Hall meeting that the light gray insignia didn’t solve the matter that ‘there are too many entities that would be deemed official or have sort of heritage blue check marks.’
‘But, as I mentioned before, we’re going to be quite aggressive in eradicating dishonesty,’ he added.
‘So, if someone attempts to spoof a brand, that account will be terminated, and we will retain their $8.’
Musk, on the other hand, is pressing ahead with plans to charge $8 per month for the blue tick. Minutes after deleting the gray checkmark, he tweeted, “The blue check will be the larger leveler.”
The official label was released at 10 a.m. ET on Wednesday, and within roughly two hours, individuals noticed the tick was vanished.
Marques Brownlee, a video producer, tweeted that his second verification was vanished, to which Musk answered, ‘I just killed it.’
The blue checkmark was previously a sought feature for users, but Musk believes it creates a ‘lords and peasants system for who has who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark,’ and that enabling everyone to wear the checkmark gives the people ‘power.’
The platform responded to the criticism by reversing the change just hours after the new gray Official symbol appeared on a number of high-profile profiles, including those for major news organizations and prominent personalities.
Musk is steadfast in his belief that Twitter will be “very robust” in combating fraud and bots.
‘But, as I mentioned before, we’re going to be incredibly aggressive in eradicating dishonesty,’ he added while conversing through the platform’s Twitter Spaces feature.
‘If someone attempts to mimic a brand, their account will be banned, and we will keep their $8.
‘And they can keep doing that, and we’ll just keep their eight bucks, and again – terrific – we can do it all day, they’ll stop.’
‘The crucial issue here is that if an account is engaging in deception, we will suspend it.’
‘Of course, they will attempt.
‘But it gets expensive, and they will need a lot of credit cards and phones – and finally they will quit paying.’
Some industry observers say that the new double-verification method will simply complicate the system.
Several celebrity and publisher accounts, including Daily Mail Online, got a ‘Official’ label with the blue verified badge early Wednesday, and word of the rollout was spreading this week.
Esther Crawford, Twitter’s director of product management, confirmed the news, saying, ‘Not all previously verified accounts will receive the ‘Official’ label, and the badge is not for sale.’
Government accounts, commercial firms, business partners, major media outlets, publishers, and certain public personalities will all receive it.
‘The new Twitter Blue does not need ID verification; instead, it is an opt-in, paid membership that includes a blue checkmark and access to select services.’
‘We’ll keep experimenting with new ways to differentiate across account kinds.’
Since Elon Musk completed his acquisition of the site last month, the improvements to the authentication mechanism have been a crucial component of his objectives.
Musk claims that allowing more individuals to verify their accounts would help to democratize Twitter and reduce the number of spam and bot accounts on the service.