A Twitter employee uncertain about his employment standing on the firm resorted to tweeting at Elon Musk on Monday, prompting the CEO to reply by mocking the person.
Haraldur Thorleifsson, an innovation group lead for the social media big, mentioned Monday that he’d misplaced entry to his work laptop 9 days earlier than. But his emails to firm representatives concerning his employment standing went unanswered, he mentioned, and the pinnacle of human assets was “not in a position to affirm if I’m an worker or not.”
So he tagged Musk in his tweet, hoping to flag the eye of the particular person in cost.
In subsequent posts, Thorleifsson added that he has been working for Twitter from Reykjavik, Iceland, ever for the reason that firm’s 2021 acquisition of Ueno, a enterprise he based.
Musk responded hours later. “What work have you ever been doing?” he requested.
Thorleifsson replied by first noting he “would wish to interrupt confidentiality” to reply, to which Musk responded succinctly, “It’s accredited, you go forward.”
When Thorleifsson proceeded to element his current work on the firm, together with some efforts he credited with saving Twitter important quantities of cash, Musk replied with a series of skeptical questions.
He punctuated the alternate with two laughing emoji earlier than continuing to mock the person, who has muscular dystrophy, in different threads.
“The truth is that this man (who’s independently rich) did no precise work, claimed as his excuse that he had a incapacity that prevented him from typing, but was concurrently tweeting up a storm,” Musk replied to one user, who had described the CEO’s alternate with Thorleifsson as “probably the most entertaining exit interview I’ve ever witnessed.”
Musk added: “Was he fired? No, you’ll be able to’t be fired in case you weren’t working within the first place!”
Thorleifsson stayed on message as Musk trolled him elsewhere on the platform. In a prolonged thread, he recounted the circumstances that led to his employment at Twitter, which included promoting Ueno as the effects of his muscular dystrophy worsened, diminishing the usage of his arms.
After Musk acquired Twitter in 2022, Thorleifsson talked to his supervisor each week about what to give attention to after which proceeded to do all of these issues, he recalled. He mentioned he additionally usually requested HR about his job description and obligations ― however by no means obtained a reply.
“To be clear. You may have each proper to put me off. That’s completely truthful and positive,” he tweeted at Musk. “However normally persons are informed when that occurs. Possibly with a letter or one thing.”
Thorleifsson additionally alleged that Twitter nonetheless owed him cost. That’s a standard grievance among the many firm’s former staff, a lot of whom say they’ve been stiffed on promised severance.
As a substitute of addressing Thorleifsson’s claims, Musk piled on with another tweet Tuesday because the Twitter spat started to go viral. Within the final little bit of irony, Musk attacked Thorleifsson’s credibility, saying he “has a distinguished, energetic Twitter account and is rich.”
Musk is the richest particular person alive and is notoriously delicate about his personal Twitter engagement.
In the meantime, Thorleifsson had posted an image of himself as he welcomed all of the “new mates” he’d gained amid the feud.
“I don’t thoughts the unhealthy phrases,” he tweeted. “They truthfully don’t trouble me. In the event that they enable you really feel higher then you need to use them. Take pleasure in your day!”