San Francisco –
If you haven’t been told you were fired, are you really fired? On Twitter, probably. And, in some cases, getting work back if necessary.
Haraldur Thorleifsson, who until recently worked at Twitter, logged into his computer to work last Sunday and was locked out along with 200 others.
In the chaotic months of layoffs and firings since Elon Musk took over the company, he may have thought he was unemployed, like others before him. not.
Instead, after nine days of no response from Twitter on whether he was still employed, Thorleifsson tweeted to Musk to get the billionaire’s attention and ask if he could get an answer on Schroedinger’s job status. I decided to find out.
“Maybe if enough people retweet it, will you answer it here?” he wrote on Monday.
Ultimately, he got his answer after a surreal Twitter exchange with Musk. Musk questioned him about his job, questioned him about his disability and accommodation needs (Torleifsson has muscular dystrophy and uses a wheelchair), and described Tolleifsson as a “prominent and active person.” I tweeted that it is. The Twitter account is wealthy” and “The reason he stood up to me in public was to get a big reward”. He said he received the email.
But late Tuesday afternoon, Musk had a change of heart.
“I would like to apologize to Hari for misinterpreting his situation. It was based on what I was told was not true or, in some cases, true but made no sense,” he said. tweeted. “He’s thinking about staying on Twitter.”
Thorleifsson did not immediately respond to messages in comments following Musk’s tweet. In an earlier email, he called the experience “surreal.”
“You had the right to fire me. But I wish you’d let me know!” he tweeted to Musk.
Based in Iceland, Thorleifsson has about 151,000 Twitter followers (Musk has over 130 million followers). He joined his Twitter in 2021, acquiring Ueno, his startup the company had previously managed.
He was praised in the Icelandic media for choosing to receive his purchase price at wages rather than a lump sum. This is because he will pay Iceland a higher tax to support Icelandic social services and safety his net.
Thorleifsson’s next move: “We are opening a restaurant in downtown Reykjavik soon,” he tweeted. “It was named after my mother.”
Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
