Technology
Elon Musk and Twitter employees engage in war of words
Elon Musk's Twitter never ceases to amaze us with the drama it has in store. It's a known secret that Twitter employees are not big fans of the new owner-cum-CEO. This "secret" came out in public when an employee openly challenged Musk's claims about the platform being slow due to poorly batched RPCs (remote procedure calls). It was certainly entertaining at the very least.
Why does this story matter?
Things aren't going well at Twitter. Well, we already knew that but now the war of words between Musk and his new employees is out in the open. It seems that most of the current crop of employees are harboring a dislike for the billionaire for the way he handled business until now. As always, he seems quite unfazed by the mutinous employees.
What did Musk say?
Musk took to Twitter to apologize for the microblogging platform being "super slow in many countries." He said, "App is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs just to render a home timeline!" For the uninitiated, RPC is a request-response protocol. It is a distributed computing technique where a computer program can call and execute a procedure on a remote server.
Musk apologized for 'Twitter being super slow'
Btw, I’d like to apologize for Twitter being super slow in many countries. App is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs just to render a home timeline!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 13, 2022
A software engineer at Twitter disagreed with Musk's claims
Eric Frohnhoefer, a staff software engineer at Twitter according to his LinkedIn profile, disagreed with Musk publicly about RPCs. He said, "I have spent ~6yrs working on Twitter for Android and can say this is wrong." To this, Musk replied and asked, "What is the right number?" He doubled down saying, "Twitter is super slow on Android. What have you done to fix that?"
An employee said that Musk is wrong
I have spent ~6yrs working on Twitter for Android and can say this is wrong. https://t.co/sh30ZxpD0N
— Eric Frohnhoefer @ 🏡 (@EricFrohnhoefer) November 13, 2022
Apps don't make RPC calls, says the engineer
The engineer had his own take on why the Twitter app is slow. According to him, the app is bloated with features that aren't used much, has years of technical debt due to choosing velocity and features over performance, and network responses take a long time. When pressed for the exact number of RPCs, Frohnhoefer said, "Zero." "Apps don't make RPC calls," he added.
Number of requests isn't the primary reason: Frohnhoefer
Frohnhoefer disagreed with Musk's claim about RPCs being the reason behind the Twitter Android app's slow performance. He said that improving the performance of the app is linked to "increasing UAM (user added module) and Ad spend." He did agree that there is room for improvement but said that the number of requests isn't the primary issue.
Another employee called out Musk for making 'sassy remark'
Musk's claim about RPCs invited a sharp response from another Twitter employee @sachee, a tech lead/staff software engineer. She said, "You did not just layoff almost all of infra and then make some sassy remark about how we do batching (sic)." "You don't get to sh#t on our infra if you don't know what the f#ck it does," she added.
Twitter employees have not yet gotten over mass layoffs
you did not just layoff almost all of infra and then make some sassy remark about how we do batching
— sach @ the hellsite (@sachee) November 13, 2022
like did you bother to even learn how graphql works https://t.co/eUhZuZZyid
Musk revoked free lunches in Twitter offices
The war between Musk and Twitter employees doesn't end there. According to The New York Times, the billionaire recently revoked free lunches for Twitter employees. He tweeted that the estimated cost per lunch served in the last 12 months in the Twitter office is greater than $400. He warred with Tracy Hawkins, the former vice president of work transformation, about this on Twitter.
Hawkins called Musk's claims 'a lie'
This is a lie. I ran this program up until a week ago when I resigned because I didn’t want to work for @elonmusk For breakfast & lunch we spent $20-$25 a day per person. This enabled employees to work thru lunchtime & mtgs. Attendance was anything from 20-50% in the offices. https://t.co/0OjbeComka
— Tracy Hawkins (@_hawko) November 13, 2022
Twitter spends $13mn/year on food service: Musk
The new Twitter boss debunked the former employee's claims saying, "Twitter spends $13M/year on food service for SF HQ." He added that the occupancy is very less considering the amount the company spends. According to him, the peak occupancy was 25%, while the average occupancy was below 10%. "There are more people preparing breakfast than eating breakfast," Musk said.
No dinner is served because there is no one
False. Twitter spends $13M/year on food service for SF HQ. Badge in records show peak occupancy was 25%, average occupancy below 10%.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 13, 2022
There are more people preparing breakfast than eating breakfast.
They don’t even bother serving dinner, because there is no one in the building.
