‘Bunch of cowards’: The Twitter engineer reportedly fired by tweet speaks out about Elon Musk’s reign

Eric Frohnhoefer, a senior engineer at Twitter, didn’t simply get fired the conventional means at an organization that has lower 50% of its employees over the previous few weeks. He obtained fired by way of a tweet by Elon Musk himself. 

Frohnhoefer tangled with Musk in a thread in regards to the Twitter software on Android, which Frohnhoefer labored on whereas on the firm, in response to Bloomberg. Musk tweeted on Nov. 13 that the explanation Twitter was gradual in so many international locations was as a result of the appliance was “1,000 poorly batched RPCs,” or distant process calls. 

“I’ve spent ~6yrs engaged on Twitter for Android and may say that is fallacious,” Frohnhoefer responded.

Their alternate continued on a thread when one other consumer chimed in, asking Frohnhoefer why he didn’t take his suggestions to Musk privately. To that, Frohnhoefer responded in a tweet saying, “perhaps he ought to ask questions privately. Possibly use Slack or e-mail.” 

After extra backwards and forwards, Musk wrote “He’s fired” in a now-deleted Tweet.  Inside hours, Frohnhoefer couldn’t entry his firm laptop computer anymore, and identical to that, his eight-year profession on the social media large was over.

https://twitter.com/EricFrohnhoefer/status/1591902285403418624

“They’re all a bunch of cowards,” he instructed Forbes about Twitter’s communication after explaining he had obtained no formal phrase from the corporate past the tweet.

“Nobody trusts anybody throughout the firm anymore,” he instructed the outlet. “How are you going to perform? Workers don’t belief the brand new administration. Administration doesn’t belief the workers. How do you suppose you’re imagined to get something executed?”

Frohnhoefer isn’t the primary or solely worker to be fired for being crucial of Musk on the very platform that he has taken over. Ben Leib, one other engineer on the firm, replied to the identical Musk tweet on Sunday that Frohnhoefer did. 

“As the previous tech lead for timelines infrastructure at Twitter, I can confidently say that this man has no concept wtf he’s speaking about,” Leib wrote. He was fired the identical day, he confirmed to Bloomberg.

https://twitter.com/bgleib/status/1591875679377031169?s=20&t=3nPWxzuVMR0OVtOi9hfqeA

If the general public discussion board was off bounds to criticize their boss, Twitter’s inside communication platforms may not be totally protected both. A number of staff who mentioned their opinions of Twitter utilizing an inside Slack channel had been reportedly fired in a single day Tuesday for his or her “current habits,” in response to Platformer reporter Casey Newton.  

Frohnhoefer and Leib didn’t reply to Fortune’s request for remark.