Elon Musk to remodel Twitter post acquisition, plans to lay off employees

Elon Musk closed the Twitter acquisition deal for 44 billion dollars on October 28. Without much ado, he is remodelling the micro-blogging platform by changing its policies and planning to introduce a council for determining decisions on content choices. 

According to various reports, Musk has planned to begin laying off employees at Twitter. The New York Times reported that Musk “planned to begin laying off workers” at Twitter as soon as on Saturday.

Lay off in

Citing people with knowledge of the situation, the report said that some managers were being asked to "draw up lists of employees to cut.” Ahead of Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, reports were circulating that he will cut headcount, with some reports saying 75 per cent of the workforce at the company could be laid off.

The NYT report said that the layoffs at Twitter "would take place before" the November 1 date when "employees were scheduled to receive stock grants as part of their compensation.

In a series of tweets, Musk updated his followers about the deal and explained the reason why he acquired Twitter through a tweet. He also said that Twitter policies shall abide by the laws of the land. 

Elon Musk to remodel Twitter

Soon after finalising the Twitter deal, he 'purged' previous CEO Parag Agarwal and other top executives. The Twitter remodelling also began shortly after the acquisition.

Just after the acquisition, Musk sparked suspicions that he might look into and make modifications to Twitter accounts that were previously banned. He tweeted, “Let the good times roll.” He also tweeted about content moderation, as per his Twitter remodelling policy, "Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints. No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes."

He said, "Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints. No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes."

Advocacy groups, however, are still sounding the alarm that the changes Musk has started making to the platform could lead to more hate online, especially for marginalised communities, claimed reports.

He documented his entry into Twitter headquarters carrying a sink in his hand, meaning, to show people that he is trying to let the feeling of being the Twitter CEO “sink in”. He also updated his Twitter description saying, “Chief Twit”. 

Replying to a Twitterati for, "It's going to be amazing watching the Left completely flip from supporting Twitter's right to set their own terms of service to advocating for governmental control of Twitter due to spreading dangerous disinformation and national security reasons once @elonmusk takes over," Musk replied, "Twitter should be as broadly inclusive as possible, serving as a fair forum for lively, even if occasionally rancorous, debate between widely divergent beliefs."

Twitter accepted Musk's proposal of acquisition in April

In the month of April, Twitter accepted Musk's proposal for the Twitter acquisition. However, he backed out alleging that Twitter failed to provide a concrete number as to how many accounts are spam and fake bots. Later, as Twitter sued Musk for terminating a deal on the pretext of fake bots, markets saw a sharp decline. However, in the end, Musk agreed to go ahead with the takeover with the originally agreed price of 54.20 USD per share.

(With inputs from ANI)