Have you ever noticed the manipulative / abusive / gaslighting language Elon Musk uses? [View all]

[DetlefK]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/elon-musk-demands-sit-down-with-engineers-amid-new-twitter-chaos

Three weeks ago, the world’s richest man bought Twitter for $44 billion.

Since then, the once-inescapable social media platform has been jerked around under Elon Musk’s erratic tutelage as scores of crucial staffers—and advertisers, which account for some 90 percent of Twitter’s revenue—head for the exits.

Through it all, Musk has projected confidence.

“The best people are staying, so I’m not super worried,” he tweeted Thursday night, while simultaneously informing employees the company would be shuttering its offices and deactivating workers’ access cards until next week.

By Friday morning, Musk finally seemed to be worried.

“Anyone who can actually write software, please report to the 10th floor at 2pm today,” he pleaded in an email obtained by Platformer, The New York Times, and others. “Before doing so, please email me a bullet point summary of what your code commits have achieved in the past 6 months.”

Step 1: Belittle the other person: "Anyone who can actually write software"
Step 2: Force them to do you a favor: "please report to the 10th floor at 2pm today"
Step 3: Make them them feel that they will owe you a favor after doing what you forced them to do: "a bullet point summary of what your code commits have achieved in the past 6 months"

"You are nobody. Prove your worth to me."

A few hours later, Musk reportedly fired off another email to remote Twitter engineers, saying he wanted to meet with them by midnight—and requested screenshots of their “most salient lines of code.”

“If possible, I would encourage you to fly to SF to present in person,” Musk reportedly wrote, adding, “[O]nly those who cannot physically get to Twitter HQ are excused.”

He said there would be “short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack,” Reuters reported.

Step 1: Belittle the other person: "If possible, I would encourage you to fly to SF"
Step 2: Force them to do you a favor: "short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack"
Step 3: Make them them feel that they will owe you a favor after doing what you forced them to do: "only those who cannot physically get to Twitter HQ are excused"

"If you actually cared, you would have come in person. Now explain this to me, and don't forget that i'm being gracious here by allowing you to call in."

Twitter’s problems began to mount quickly after Musk lopped off about half its workforce upon assuming command early this month. The 2,900 staff members who remained at Twitter received an ultimatum: Anyone who wanted to stay would need to be “extremely hardcore” about being there.

“Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore,” Musk wrote in a memo sent early Wednesday.

“This will mean working long hours at high intensity,” Musk said in the missive, which was first reported by The Washington Post. “Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”

Step 1: Belittle the other person: "we will need to be extremely hardcore"
Step 2: Force them to do you a favor: "This will mean working long hours at high intensity"
Step 3: Make them them feel that they will owe you a favor after doing what you forced them to do: "Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade"

"You don't work hard enough. If you work harder than ever before, then I might consider judging you as doing the bare minimum."