In another round of fresh layoffs, Twitter sacked over 50 employees including Esther Crawford, the company’s product manager who led several projects, including the company’s Twitter Blue verification subscription and its upcoming payments platform. During Twitter’s overhaul after Elon Musk took over the company, Crawford’s picture went viral where she was sleeping on the floor of Twitter’s office in a sleeping bag and eye mask.
She tweeted the picture with a caption, “When your team is pushing round the clock to make deadlines sometimes you #SleepWhereYouWork.”
The list of sacked employees also includes Martijn de Kuijper, the creator of the now-shuttered Revue newsletter platform that the company acquired in 2021, according to The Verge report.
Since Musk took over Twitter in October last year, the company has been through at least four rounds of layoffs. In November 2022, the micro-blogging platform’s new boss sacked two-thirds of the company’s 7,500 employees.
On Sunday, as per reports, the affected employees received notices via email on Saturday. The recent mover targeted people working in a number of departments, including ads and infrastructure engineering. The company also shut down two of its three India offices and directed its employees to work from home The company now has less than 2,000 employees.
Following Musk’s takeover, the Blue Bird has managed to garner regular headlines about its weakening content moderation policies, a surge in fake accounts, and the re-activation of accounts of some controversial celebrities.
It is no surprise that the social media company has been since reeling financially as it introduced several cost-cutting measures including laying off several of its employees. Twitter is also undergoing several legal proceedings relating to non-payment of rent for its offices and other services acquired by the company.
Moreover, since the change in ownership, Twitter is also fighting to retain advertisers, and last year launched Twitter Blue with the view of growing revenue. In India, the monthly Twitter Blue subscription cost users Rs 650 for the web and Rs 900 each for Android and iOS devices. Twitter charges Rs 6,800 for a yearly subscription.
