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Extremely Hardcore: Inside Elon Musk's Twitter
“the bird is freed”
– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 27, 2022
When Elon Musk took over Twitter, commentators were rooting for the visionary behind Tesla and SpaceX to succeed. Here was a tough leader who could grab back power from Twitter’s entitled workforce, motivate them to get “extremely hardcore,” and supercharge Twitter’s profit and potential. And it was all out of the goodness of his own heart, rooted in his fervent belief in the necessity of making Twitter friendlier to free speech. “I didn’t do it to make more money,” Musk said. “I did it to try and help humanity, whom I love.”
Once Musk charged into the Twitter headquarters, the command-and-control playbook Musk honed at Tesla and SpaceX went off the rails immediately. Distilling hundreds of hours of interviews with more than sixty employees, thousands of pages of internal documents, Slack messages, presentations, as well as court filings and congressional testimony, Extremely Hardcore is the true story of how Musk reshaped the world’s online public square into his own personal megaphone.
You’ll hear from employees who witnessed the destruction of their workplace in real-time, seeing years of progress to fight disinformation and hate speech wiped out within a matter of months. There’s the machine-learning savant who went all-in on Twitter 2.0 before getting betrayed by his new CEO, the father whose need for healthcare swept him into Musk’s inner circle, the trust and safety expert who became the subject of a harassment campaign his former boss incited, and the many other employees who tried to save the company from their new boss’s worst instincts. This is the story of Twitter, but it’s also a chronicle of the post-pandemic labor movement, a war between executives and a workforce newly awakened to their rights and needs.
Riveting, character-driven, and filled with jaw-dropping revelations, Extremely Hardcore is the definitive, fly-on-the-wall story of how Elon Musk lit $44 billion on fire and burned down Twitter. It’s the next best thing to being there, and you won’t have to sleep in the Twitter office to get the scoop.
– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 27, 2022
When Elon Musk took over Twitter, commentators were rooting for the visionary behind Tesla and SpaceX to succeed. Here was a tough leader who could grab back power from Twitter’s entitled workforce, motivate them to get “extremely hardcore,” and supercharge Twitter’s profit and potential. And it was all out of the goodness of his own heart, rooted in his fervent belief in the necessity of making Twitter friendlier to free speech. “I didn’t do it to make more money,” Musk said. “I did it to try and help humanity, whom I love.”
Once Musk charged into the Twitter headquarters, the command-and-control playbook Musk honed at Tesla and SpaceX went off the rails immediately. Distilling hundreds of hours of interviews with more than sixty employees, thousands of pages of internal documents, Slack messages, presentations, as well as court filings and congressional testimony, Extremely Hardcore is the true story of how Musk reshaped the world’s online public square into his own personal megaphone.
You’ll hear from employees who witnessed the destruction of their workplace in real-time, seeing years of progress to fight disinformation and hate speech wiped out within a matter of months. There’s the machine-learning savant who went all-in on Twitter 2.0 before getting betrayed by his new CEO, the father whose need for healthcare swept him into Musk’s inner circle, the trust and safety expert who became the subject of a harassment campaign his former boss incited, and the many other employees who tried to save the company from their new boss’s worst instincts. This is the story of Twitter, but it’s also a chronicle of the post-pandemic labor movement, a war between executives and a workforce newly awakened to their rights and needs.
Riveting, character-driven, and filled with jaw-dropping revelations, Extremely Hardcore is the definitive, fly-on-the-wall story of how Elon Musk lit $44 billion on fire and burned down Twitter. It’s the next best thing to being there, and you won’t have to sleep in the Twitter office to get the scoop.
352 pages, Hardcover
Published February 13, 2024
About the author
Zoë Schiffer
1 book13 followersZoë Schiffer is the managing editor of Platformer where she covers Twitter, X Corp., and Elon Musk. Previously, she was a senior reporter at The Verge where she reported on the labor movement in Silicon Valley. Her work has been featured in New York Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, and Vox. She’s appeared on CNN, NBC, CNBC, and the BBC.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 113 reviews
February 16, 2024
It’s a strangely exciting experience to have a part of your life codified in a book. The slack messages, the emails quoted in this book are ones I received. I lived through the ordeal outlined here so it will always have a special place on my bookshelf.
Objectively, the book is very well sourced, contains almost no speculation and reads more like a factual account of what transpired. In any other book about a corporation, that would be dull but what unfolded at Twitter was inherently full of drama and doesn’t require embellishment.
I’m awestruck by the folks brave enough to have shared their personal stories here and how Zoe has managed to execute this book in such a short timeframe. My only gripe is that it doesn’t fully bring to light the emotional upheavals that everyone involved went through and leaves out some of the more outrageous grievances that former employees went through, but that might have been an intentional choice to make the book more “neutral” sounding and/or Zoe might have been personally asked to not share some of those stories.
A true reporter, Zoe reserves her own opinions and presents what occurred quite objectively.
Highly recommend!
Objectively, the book is very well sourced, contains almost no speculation and reads more like a factual account of what transpired. In any other book about a corporation, that would be dull but what unfolded at Twitter was inherently full of drama and doesn’t require embellishment.
I’m awestruck by the folks brave enough to have shared their personal stories here and how Zoe has managed to execute this book in such a short timeframe. My only gripe is that it doesn’t fully bring to light the emotional upheavals that everyone involved went through and leaves out some of the more outrageous grievances that former employees went through, but that might have been an intentional choice to make the book more “neutral” sounding and/or Zoe might have been personally asked to not share some of those stories.
A true reporter, Zoe reserves her own opinions and presents what occurred quite objectively.
Highly recommend!
February 20, 2024
Very solid chronicle of Musk's takeover of Twitter (so far).
It has a good pace, many details, and a reasonable level of objectivity. The main drawback is that ... if you were paying attention to publicly available information, you would learn very little new. In fact, I was really surprised that Platformer's journalist dedicated pretty much solely to Twitter at that point didn't have access to more internals.
Another drawback was that, in fact, the history remains w/o conclusion. At this point, it is still unclear whether:
- Musk has saved or doomed Twitter
- X will become an everything app or not
- the quest for free speech is just a b*llshit or a real mission for Musk
etc.
In the end, it was a nice, fast, meaty read. But keeping in mind the intensity of the shitstorm at Twitter, my expectations were much higher.
It has a good pace, many details, and a reasonable level of objectivity. The main drawback is that ... if you were paying attention to publicly available information, you would learn very little new. In fact, I was really surprised that Platformer's journalist dedicated pretty much solely to Twitter at that point didn't have access to more internals.
Another drawback was that, in fact, the history remains w/o conclusion. At this point, it is still unclear whether:
- Musk has saved or doomed Twitter
- X will become an everything app or not
- the quest for free speech is just a b*llshit or a real mission for Musk
etc.
In the end, it was a nice, fast, meaty read. But keeping in mind the intensity of the shitstorm at Twitter, my expectations were much higher.
April 8, 2024
‘Extremely Hardcore’ tries so hard to be a critical analysis of Elon Musk but ends up feeling more like a misguided hit piece, dripping with a kind of childish spite that’s more laughable than insightful.
And then there’s the whole nostalgia trip for Twitter’s ‘golden era,’ which is baffling. It’s glaringly obvious that Twitter was far from flourishing; a new CEO shaking things up and nudging people towards productivity shouldn’t be controversial, but it’s evident that the author doesn’t really understand how capitalism works
The lengths to which the author goes to champion the underperforming former employees is bewildering, to say the least. Anyone with even a sliver of business acumen can see that it’s a flawed argument, but then again our writer seems to have 0 knowledge around how companies function.
Finally waving goodbye to the Platformer newsletter was a relief. I’m keen to steer clear of anything else written by the author, or his often-mentioned boss, Casey Newton. Their “perspective” won’t be missed.
And then there’s the whole nostalgia trip for Twitter’s ‘golden era,’ which is baffling. It’s glaringly obvious that Twitter was far from flourishing; a new CEO shaking things up and nudging people towards productivity shouldn’t be controversial, but it’s evident that the author doesn’t really understand how capitalism works
The lengths to which the author goes to champion the underperforming former employees is bewildering, to say the least. Anyone with even a sliver of business acumen can see that it’s a flawed argument, but then again our writer seems to have 0 knowledge around how companies function.
Finally waving goodbye to the Platformer newsletter was a relief. I’m keen to steer clear of anything else written by the author, or his often-mentioned boss, Casey Newton. Their “perspective” won’t be missed.
February 17, 2024
When the events in this book were unfolding, I mostly followed them through Schiffer's blogs and articles on Platformer. To some degree, this book is reliving that drip-feed of real time news in an all at once deluge. But there is also room to breathe now and to marvel at the amount of corporate damage Musk achieved in a scant year. From October 2022 to October 2023, Musk and then Musk and Yaccarino took a company, its employees, advertisers, and customers through every level of ineptitude — and in the case of two Trust and Safety team members, actual physical danger — that only overweening hubris coupled with novice-level tech expertise can achieve. It is truly breathtaking and I can only imagine that the GOP laments that Musk cannot be their Presidential candidate.
The book doesn’t answer - perhaps no one can - if the whole business was a colossal blunder. A shitpost with an arbitrary figure named turned into an offer that the Twitter Board had a fiduciary duty to accept. But Schiffer provides more detail leading to that moment that suggests Musk was intent on doing Twitter harm in some fashion.
The story of Randall Lin, which was not covered in real time, is especially sobering and feels like something that would happen in a Stalinist regime. And, apparently, in an American corporation.
The book doesn’t answer - perhaps no one can - if the whole business was a colossal blunder. A shitpost with an arbitrary figure named turned into an offer that the Twitter Board had a fiduciary duty to accept. But Schiffer provides more detail leading to that moment that suggests Musk was intent on doing Twitter harm in some fashion.
The story of Randall Lin, which was not covered in real time, is especially sobering and feels like something that would happen in a Stalinist regime. And, apparently, in an American corporation.
May 16, 2024
An engaging and in-depth account of musks time as the owner of twitter, now X. I was interested in reading this after finishing Walter Isaacson’s biography of Musk. That book touched briefly on the start of Musk’s takeover, but ended before a lot of the juicy stuff. This book did a great job covering everything I was interested in, but failed to get as deep into things as Isaacson’s book. I felt that most of it was a rehashing of the headlines I’ve seen over last couple of years. Perhaps my expectations were too high going in.
March 17, 2024
Zoë Schiffer does a great job reporting out the experience of Elon Musk buying Twitter (I won’t call it X!) and what that was like for the company’s employees. As a dude who thought a lot about the hell site in the mid-2010s, this book was a nice way to say goodbye to the dream of what that site once was and could have been
April 7, 2024
The definitive book on the Twitter->Saga. Well-reported, lots of good access, and actually covers details and things that you wouldn’t necessarily know even if you closely followed this mess as it unfolded in real time.
March 13, 2024
A phenomenal series of unforced errors by one of god’s least cool children
Read
April 13, 2024Read 1/2 only.. pretty much a play-by-play account dishing out how it went down on Twitter, through the anecdotes of key internal employees and tech journalists
April 8, 2024
absolutely incredible. spiciest internet drama i've read in a good long while. i cant believe musk bought twitter for a weed joke
March 19, 2024
Below average read. An average stitching of surface events. This book could’ve been a series of articles. Wouldn’t recommend
March 4, 2024
Not nearly as good or dishy as I had hoped. And the book is far leaner than one is led to believe. I finished the book at like 60-some percent. The rest was notes. Disappointment all around. I wanted to love this book, too.
February 26, 2024
if you ever used twitter in a meaningful way, this shit hits different. bravo zoe
March 1, 2024
Great read! The most common notes I added in the margins were “wow” and “lol”. I was following this story as it unfolded but still learned a lot, especially from the interviews with former employees.
March 11, 2024
The reporting was great but wow I wish I knew less about Elon Musk.
April 12, 2024
Incredible chronically and reporting. Bird app is a mess. But the person who read this audiobook sounded so rigid which made it kinda annoying/dull to listening.
July 26, 2024
If you start this booking keeping in mind that it’s very, very subjective and one-sided, then it’s actually a fun and snarky read. Zoe’s sarcastic comments made me laugh at times; she knew how to spin this story.
July 13, 2024
Very much enjoyed this book it gave a good insight into what happened with Twitter and seemed to come from a good source with an interesting story that was engaging and fun to read
May 19, 2024
Dit is geen biografie van Elon Musk maar een juicy omschrijving van zijn Twitter take-over. Ik heb er van gesmuld. Lezen als je houdt van boeken over bedrijven, politiek en media!
July 29, 2024
Stilius, detalės, istorija - 5*. Man patinka biznio istorijos, čia grynai atskleistas Twitter vidus nuo Musko idėjos perimti Twitter, iki valdymo perėmimo ir pokyčių nuo Twitter link X. Labai įdomu, daug detalių ir, kiek sudariau įspūdį tikrindamas šaltinius, gana tiksliai nušviesta ir paaiškinta. Muskas pats komentuoti ir duoti interviu atsisakė. Nežinau ar dėl to, visgi naratyvas ganėtinai šališkas anti-muskiškas, man asmeniškai neatrodo, jog jo visas takeover tokie "vieni vartai" riedėjimas nuo kalno, kaip bandoma įteigti. Knygos tampa vis labiau šališkos, tai šita viena iš jų.
March 29, 2024
A compelling retelling of the fiasco that was Elon Musk’s takeover of X/Twitter. The string of unforced errors, blatant mistreatment of employees and moments of pure hypocrisy are pretty damning for Musk. Still, if there is another side to the story, I doubt it’s as entertaining as this one.
The tale is thoroughly crafted by a journalist who had a ring side seat to much of the action, but you won’t learn much new if you were following the OG story when it all went down. Of course, we all need to wait and see for ourselves what the ending will be (grabs popcorn 🍿).
What a douche.
The tale is thoroughly crafted by a journalist who had a ring side seat to much of the action, but you won’t learn much new if you were following the OG story when it all went down. Of course, we all need to wait and see for ourselves what the ending will be (grabs popcorn 🍿).
What a douche.
February 26, 2024
Extremely Hardcore
Unfortunately lacks any access or firsthand information. The most work the author seems to have done is paste in some tweets that support her arguments now and then.
The Lin stuff is new I suppose, but mostly uninteresting and irrelevant. If there had been any other direct source willing to work with the author I imagine his role would’ve been cut significantly.
It’s a good enough chronicle of events based on the journalism of others but lacks any new information or insight. Isaacson does a better job on the Twitter stuff than this little book does.
Unfortunately lacks any access or firsthand information. The most work the author seems to have done is paste in some tweets that support her arguments now and then.
The Lin stuff is new I suppose, but mostly uninteresting and irrelevant. If there had been any other direct source willing to work with the author I imagine his role would’ve been cut significantly.
It’s a good enough chronicle of events based on the journalism of others but lacks any new information or insight. Isaacson does a better job on the Twitter stuff than this little book does.
Want to read
July 15, 2024.
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Vond dit boek in de fysieke krant (eigenlijk een toegift bij een ander). Dit weekend (za 3 maart 2024). Neem aan Volkskrant.
https://www.botuitgevers.nl/product/e... uitgever
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo... oorspronkelijke Engelse uitgever met https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo... audio 523 minuten
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... url
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.
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Vond dit boek in de fysieke krant (eigenlijk een toegift bij een ander). Dit weekend (za 3 maart 2024). Neem aan Volkskrant.
https://www.botuitgevers.nl/product/e... uitgever
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo... oorspronkelijke Engelse uitgever met https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo... audio 523 minuten
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... url
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Read
March 11, 2024Did not get very far - it just felt like a bunch of insider gossip, which is not for me.
April 25, 2024
Honestly, 95% of this is stuff I've seen on Zoe's twitter feed in the past 2 years and few other places on twitter overall. Elon is, objectively, a manchild. He is, generally, a bad person, an immature person, a petty and vindictive person. I, personally, dislike him and his entire demeanor. He thinks he's hilarious and a genius, but he comes off as annoyingly childish and rather dumb. I've watched endless interviews with the guy over the years, and I've seen how he runs his companies. He got lucky with one company and turned that into bullying his way to the top of a few other organizations. Twitter used to be a fantastic source for a lot of garbage but also a TON of smart stuff. Any issue you could think of, usually stuff happening right now, you could go to Twitter, search the topic, and the top results would almost always be experts of various sorts on the issue at hand. People actively talking about pretty much any current event or topic that required expertise. It was easy to filter out the misinformation and the crazies. It was easy to see, based on the checkmarks, who was an expert, a journalist, a government official, leaders of think tanks/orgs, etc. Now, you open twitter, and it seems the people that are pushed to the top are the craziest (usually far right weirdos) imaginable. This bok details the many ways that Elon Musk, ultimate manchild, starved for attention from every angle, bought Twitter, turned it into the absurdly named "X" and ruined the platform.
Zoe does a nice job with some insider takes here, a lot of intelligent discussion on stuff from people inside twitter as it happened, including an engineer who seemed to adore Musk before he was summarily fired for something he didn't even do. Much of the public-facing stuff, events that I followed on twitter as Elon did them are just reminders of how tumultuous and, frankly, insane some of the stuff has been. The twitter blue debacle that any normal person could have seen coming, Elon spreading conspiracy theories that Nancy Pelosi's husband, attacked by a crazy guy with a hammer, was actually attacked by a supposed gay lover, Elon's insistence on bringing back to the platform the most vile people (once banned, rightfully, from the platform), Elon's obsession with replying to, parroting, spreading nonsense from various alt-right figures. It's all documented here.
It's wild to see how badly the business is run, and how so many decisions (many of them I had never heard before) were done...Musk, consistently, convinced he's smarter than anyone in any room- let's do it my way, which almost always turns out to be the worst way possible. Hell, at one point in the book, we ponder the question of why, after ditching all of the twitter branding to turn the platform into X- why did Elon even want to buy it all? He spent $44 billion to basically own a URL that he eventually changed to x.com and own some servers? He could have easily created his own twitter alternative for far less money, and that he's destroyed half the value of the company or more in 2 years is amazing. The man desires attention at all times from all people, and he comes off as a truly bizarre dude because of it.
This book delves into all of this, and it was interesting enough to keep my attention. I like this story, mostly because I love that people get to see what a buffoon the man is- he spent so many years trying to convince all of us of his genius, only to buy twitter and prove to all of us he was none of the above in a mere 2 years. I used to use twitter daily, interacting with all sorts of people. I ditched the platform over a year ago. The insanity from Musk and having trouble finding all those experts that used to be so readily available at a click of the mouse was enough for me. Plus, who wants to give attention to some of the most vile, disgusting racists, sexists, alt right weirdos, etc. on a daily basis? Elon ruined a once great platform, and we lost a lot when he did so. Zoe does a nice job of reminding us of it all- some of it I had forgotten and some stuff I never knew about. Solid read if only to get a glimpse into the mind of Musk and how so many of his have been fooled into thinking a lot of people are geniuses when they are almost surely fools.
Zoe does a nice job with some insider takes here, a lot of intelligent discussion on stuff from people inside twitter as it happened, including an engineer who seemed to adore Musk before he was summarily fired for something he didn't even do. Much of the public-facing stuff, events that I followed on twitter as Elon did them are just reminders of how tumultuous and, frankly, insane some of the stuff has been. The twitter blue debacle that any normal person could have seen coming, Elon spreading conspiracy theories that Nancy Pelosi's husband, attacked by a crazy guy with a hammer, was actually attacked by a supposed gay lover, Elon's insistence on bringing back to the platform the most vile people (once banned, rightfully, from the platform), Elon's obsession with replying to, parroting, spreading nonsense from various alt-right figures. It's all documented here.
It's wild to see how badly the business is run, and how so many decisions (many of them I had never heard before) were done...Musk, consistently, convinced he's smarter than anyone in any room- let's do it my way, which almost always turns out to be the worst way possible. Hell, at one point in the book, we ponder the question of why, after ditching all of the twitter branding to turn the platform into X- why did Elon even want to buy it all? He spent $44 billion to basically own a URL that he eventually changed to x.com and own some servers? He could have easily created his own twitter alternative for far less money, and that he's destroyed half the value of the company or more in 2 years is amazing. The man desires attention at all times from all people, and he comes off as a truly bizarre dude because of it.
This book delves into all of this, and it was interesting enough to keep my attention. I like this story, mostly because I love that people get to see what a buffoon the man is- he spent so many years trying to convince all of us of his genius, only to buy twitter and prove to all of us he was none of the above in a mere 2 years. I used to use twitter daily, interacting with all sorts of people. I ditched the platform over a year ago. The insanity from Musk and having trouble finding all those experts that used to be so readily available at a click of the mouse was enough for me. Plus, who wants to give attention to some of the most vile, disgusting racists, sexists, alt right weirdos, etc. on a daily basis? Elon ruined a once great platform, and we lost a lot when he did so. Zoe does a nice job of reminding us of it all- some of it I had forgotten and some stuff I never knew about. Solid read if only to get a glimpse into the mind of Musk and how so many of his have been fooled into thinking a lot of people are geniuses when they are almost surely fools.
April 1, 2024
I suppose this book is best described as a companion to Hatching Twitter: A True Story of Money, Power, Friendship, and Betrayal. Musk is certainly an interesting fellow, and I have Isaacson's biography of him on my list. Lots of money does funny things to people. It's made Musk into a narcissistic autocrat who has taken Charlie Wilson's comment about General Motors ("What's good for General Motors is Good for the Country")** to heart. Substitute Twitter for General Motors.
You will remember that Musk offered $44 billion to purchase Twitter only to back down but then be forced to buy it. The company was saddled with a huge amount of debt (that continues to rise), Musk fired hundreds of employees, many of whom were involved with content moderation, others simply because they had the temerity to tell him the truth. Then he re-branded Twitter into X (he seems to have a passion for that letter -- personally I prefer the letter B for bullshit...) Advertisers began to flee in droves as the site became home to right-wing kooks and hate-mongers all in the name of free expression. What Musk did not recognize was that “Advertisers play an underappreciated role in content moderation,” says Evelyn Douek, a professor and speech regulation expert. “So much of the content moderation discourse has always been a highfalutin discussion on free speech, on safety versus voice. But content moderation is a product, and brand safety has always been a key driver in terms of how these platforms create value.”
Musk promised all sorts of things, including money, to some of the employees, promises he has yet to fulfill. Indeed, there are many outstanding lawsuits to force him to pay off on those promises. (Hundreds of millions in severance pay guarantees. As of today, April 1st, settlement talks have gone nowhere.)
It's important to remember that both of these books reflect the personal opinions and experiences of those willing to talk. Many of those remaining with the company were afraid to talk for fear of repercussions. As these author states: "This book is a snapshot of the lives of Twitter employees during a pivotal moment in tech history." Looking at the history of tech, lots of prominent, highly touted apps fall by the wayside, so I'm not sure just how "pivotal" Twitter/X is/was.
"But anyone seeking those answers discovered that the transition from Twitter to X wrought something entirely different. Musk’s intentions became clearer. In his mind, the company’s success had nothing to do with people’s work ethic or ability to think creatively. Instead, it was about placating the person at the top. Musk, after all, was the man with the vision. He was the one on the hero’s journey."
**This is the popular version of the quote. What he actually said was "Yes, sir; I could. I cannot conceive of one because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa. The difference did not exist. Our company is too big. It goes with the welfare of the country. Our contribution to the Nation is quite considerable.” (p. 26 of the transcript of his confirmation hearings for Secretary of Defense.) Substitute Twitter for General Motors and Musk believes this. Source: https://blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/20...
You will remember that Musk offered $44 billion to purchase Twitter only to back down but then be forced to buy it. The company was saddled with a huge amount of debt (that continues to rise), Musk fired hundreds of employees, many of whom were involved with content moderation, others simply because they had the temerity to tell him the truth. Then he re-branded Twitter into X (he seems to have a passion for that letter -- personally I prefer the letter B for bullshit...) Advertisers began to flee in droves as the site became home to right-wing kooks and hate-mongers all in the name of free expression. What Musk did not recognize was that “Advertisers play an underappreciated role in content moderation,” says Evelyn Douek, a professor and speech regulation expert. “So much of the content moderation discourse has always been a highfalutin discussion on free speech, on safety versus voice. But content moderation is a product, and brand safety has always been a key driver in terms of how these platforms create value.”
Musk promised all sorts of things, including money, to some of the employees, promises he has yet to fulfill. Indeed, there are many outstanding lawsuits to force him to pay off on those promises. (Hundreds of millions in severance pay guarantees. As of today, April 1st, settlement talks have gone nowhere.)
It's important to remember that both of these books reflect the personal opinions and experiences of those willing to talk. Many of those remaining with the company were afraid to talk for fear of repercussions. As these author states: "This book is a snapshot of the lives of Twitter employees during a pivotal moment in tech history." Looking at the history of tech, lots of prominent, highly touted apps fall by the wayside, so I'm not sure just how "pivotal" Twitter/X is/was.
"But anyone seeking those answers discovered that the transition from Twitter to X wrought something entirely different. Musk’s intentions became clearer. In his mind, the company’s success had nothing to do with people’s work ethic or ability to think creatively. Instead, it was about placating the person at the top. Musk, after all, was the man with the vision. He was the one on the hero’s journey."
**This is the popular version of the quote. What he actually said was "Yes, sir; I could. I cannot conceive of one because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa. The difference did not exist. Our company is too big. It goes with the welfare of the country. Our contribution to the Nation is quite considerable.” (p. 26 of the transcript of his confirmation hearings for Secretary of Defense.) Substitute Twitter for General Motors and Musk believes this. Source: https://blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/20...
March 13, 2024
For many years, Twitter had been defined by the hands-off leadership style of co-founder Jack Dorsey. Twitter's staff spent years trying to protect the platform against impulsive billionaires. Then, trouble arrived when one such billionaire made himself the company's CEO, ending the era of Twitter giving everyone a voice, from Occupy Wall Street to the Arab Spring. Overnight, Twitter went from a company that was short on profits but long on influence to being all about profits and one person's ego.
Santa-Barbara-based journalist Schiffer draws on interviews with 60+ employees, internal documents, court filings, and congressional testimony to produce an account of Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter and the ensuing chaos. She examines the effects of the volatile entrepreneur's takeover on the social media company and its thousands of employees (resignations, firings, etc.).
Beginning in January 2022, Musk began accumulating Twitter shares. A few months later, he joined the board and made an offer to purchase the business. Suits and countersuits slowed the process, which finally ended in the fall of that year, when Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion. Intent on cutting costs, Musk instituted massive layoffs, including engineers, content managers, and root password holders (critical to the company's operations), actions that weakened morale and caused advertising revenue to nose-dive.
Schiffer concedes that Musk's product ideas were reasonable, "but they were all over the map. In addition to relaunching Twitter Blue, he was exploring a payments platform, long-form video, long-form tweets, and encrypted direct messages." Since his childhood, "Musk had harbored a belief that he was destined to have a great impact on the world." His track record confirms that he is capable of having impact, but not necessarily that the impact will be positive in all cases.
There is general agreement in many different reviews of the book that Schiffer has done a remarkable job of researching her subject, but she leaves several important questions unanswered. Here are some examples. Is Twitter doomed to failure under Musk's leadership? Technical failures are well-described, but what about Musk's free-speech hypocrisy? She certainly has opinions on these questions, given her long-term reporting on Twitter, but she does not share her views with the book's readers.
For those who don't care for a book-size report with lots of details, the following New York Magazine article by the author, Casey Newton, and Alex Heath might be considered a good substitute.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/artic...
Santa-Barbara-based journalist Schiffer draws on interviews with 60+ employees, internal documents, court filings, and congressional testimony to produce an account of Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter and the ensuing chaos. She examines the effects of the volatile entrepreneur's takeover on the social media company and its thousands of employees (resignations, firings, etc.).
Beginning in January 2022, Musk began accumulating Twitter shares. A few months later, he joined the board and made an offer to purchase the business. Suits and countersuits slowed the process, which finally ended in the fall of that year, when Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion. Intent on cutting costs, Musk instituted massive layoffs, including engineers, content managers, and root password holders (critical to the company's operations), actions that weakened morale and caused advertising revenue to nose-dive.
Schiffer concedes that Musk's product ideas were reasonable, "but they were all over the map. In addition to relaunching Twitter Blue, he was exploring a payments platform, long-form video, long-form tweets, and encrypted direct messages." Since his childhood, "Musk had harbored a belief that he was destined to have a great impact on the world." His track record confirms that he is capable of having impact, but not necessarily that the impact will be positive in all cases.
There is general agreement in many different reviews of the book that Schiffer has done a remarkable job of researching her subject, but she leaves several important questions unanswered. Here are some examples. Is Twitter doomed to failure under Musk's leadership? Technical failures are well-described, but what about Musk's free-speech hypocrisy? She certainly has opinions on these questions, given her long-term reporting on Twitter, but she does not share her views with the book's readers.
For those who don't care for a book-size report with lots of details, the following New York Magazine article by the author, Casey Newton, and Alex Heath might be considered a good substitute.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/artic...
February 22, 2024
This is a well-researched, fast paced look into the sometimes unbelievable story of Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter. It is abundantly clear that Zoe did her homework in researching and writing this story. She explained the technical elements of the app in enough detail for the reader to understand without getting bogged down in the minutiae. I paid some attention to this drama as it was unfolding but I think a well versed Twitter user might not learn as much. She provides more depth (through interviews and excerpts from court documents) but since Elon essentially live tweeted this entire debacle, the book doesn't necessarily add anything revolutionary to the narrative.
What held this book back for me was a lack of wider perspective. Zoe spends so much time inside the walls of Twitter HQ and the chaos of Elon's leadership that she fails to ask bigger questions surrounding free speech, privacy rights, and the labor movement. I wanted Zoe to contextualize Elon's free speech hypocrisy and spend as much time flushing this out as she did flushing out the technical failures. As a long-time reporter on Twitter, she certainly has those opinions, but doesn't engage with the topic in a meaningful way. We also don't get an answer to the biggest question facing Twitter, does Elon's takeover doom it to failure? It is almost certainly too soon to tell but given the depth of her previous reporting and the amount of research she did she doesn't give the reader an answer and thus the conclusion fell a bit flat.
What held this book back for me was a lack of wider perspective. Zoe spends so much time inside the walls of Twitter HQ and the chaos of Elon's leadership that she fails to ask bigger questions surrounding free speech, privacy rights, and the labor movement. I wanted Zoe to contextualize Elon's free speech hypocrisy and spend as much time flushing this out as she did flushing out the technical failures. As a long-time reporter on Twitter, she certainly has those opinions, but doesn't engage with the topic in a meaningful way. We also don't get an answer to the biggest question facing Twitter, does Elon's takeover doom it to failure? It is almost certainly too soon to tell but given the depth of her previous reporting and the amount of research she did she doesn't give the reader an answer and thus the conclusion fell a bit flat.
July 23, 2024
The book begins with a report on how Elon Musk came to buy Twitter; how he made his offer, how he tried to get out of buying it, how he was forced to go through with it and how he sought to pay for the $44 billion price tag.
It then defines the early days in “managing” the company. After this, the book becomes topical with short chapters on specific issues or people. I presume these are articles printed in full or adapted from the author’s coverage of these events in the “Platformer”.
Twitter had problems and Musk very quickly, added to them. He didn’t consult with managers and executives when he made thousands of layoffs in his first weeks. Schiffer shows how staff already stressed in keeping operations afloat, attempt, without key personnel, to work on the new pet projects with tight deadlines assigned by Musk.
Musk didn’t consult anyone in restoring banned s---posters either. The advertisers notice right away and flee, (Is it really -49% week over week?!)
When you consider the massive layoffs without consideration for the expertise needed by the company or the ramifications of bringing back racist and violent posters, other solely made decisions like changing the name from Twitter to X, starting the “blue check mark” subscriptions, or reversing a private flight headed for Christmas holidays to stop in Sacramento to physically move servers to Portland (a job taking several days) are not so striking.
What is clear is that Musk is full of himself. With a reduced staff you would think he’d guard their time as precious, but he has them working on algorithms that assure he has more likes than President Biden.
Maybe Musk is playing a long game with Twitter. If his goal is to make an “everything” ap (not much discussed in this book), he might have done better building it from scratch.
The company may just drown in litigation. Schiffer covers some of the pending suits from fired employees. She writes of places when Musk has stopped paying rent, and brushes other aside other invoices. I presume the unpaid landlords and vendors will not just go away. In today’s news, (7/12/24) the EU will be fining X (or is it Musk or Twitter) because the blue check marks are deceptive for users and advertisers. Undoubtedly there is more to come.
This book would be better understood in the hands of a Twitter user and/or techie. For this lay reader, some of the technical issues were not clear. Schiffer helps out the non-IT reader by covering some of the ramifications of the technical issues.
This is a complex story and Zoe Schiffer has done well in this first cut of the first act of what will surely be a much longer drama.
It then defines the early days in “managing” the company. After this, the book becomes topical with short chapters on specific issues or people. I presume these are articles printed in full or adapted from the author’s coverage of these events in the “Platformer”.
Twitter had problems and Musk very quickly, added to them. He didn’t consult with managers and executives when he made thousands of layoffs in his first weeks. Schiffer shows how staff already stressed in keeping operations afloat, attempt, without key personnel, to work on the new pet projects with tight deadlines assigned by Musk.
Musk didn’t consult anyone in restoring banned s---posters either. The advertisers notice right away and flee, (Is it really -49% week over week?!)
When you consider the massive layoffs without consideration for the expertise needed by the company or the ramifications of bringing back racist and violent posters, other solely made decisions like changing the name from Twitter to X, starting the “blue check mark” subscriptions, or reversing a private flight headed for Christmas holidays to stop in Sacramento to physically move servers to Portland (a job taking several days) are not so striking.
What is clear is that Musk is full of himself. With a reduced staff you would think he’d guard their time as precious, but he has them working on algorithms that assure he has more likes than President Biden.
Maybe Musk is playing a long game with Twitter. If his goal is to make an “everything” ap (not much discussed in this book), he might have done better building it from scratch.
The company may just drown in litigation. Schiffer covers some of the pending suits from fired employees. She writes of places when Musk has stopped paying rent, and brushes other aside other invoices. I presume the unpaid landlords and vendors will not just go away. In today’s news, (7/12/24) the EU will be fining X (or is it Musk or Twitter) because the blue check marks are deceptive for users and advertisers. Undoubtedly there is more to come.
This book would be better understood in the hands of a Twitter user and/or techie. For this lay reader, some of the technical issues were not clear. Schiffer helps out the non-IT reader by covering some of the ramifications of the technical issues.
This is a complex story and Zoe Schiffer has done well in this first cut of the first act of what will surely be a much longer drama.
May 13, 2024
I listened to the audio book which was phenomenal! This book is well written, personal, and extremely interesting. I have a passing interest in tech and corporate America, and this book is inspiring me to pick up other business related novels and see what else is out there.
As a Twitter user who experienced a lot of the milestones Schiffer talks about, hearing the boardroom deals, slack messages, and emails behind them is fascinating. I loved how Schiffer brought in her personal perspective as a journalist, giving us little windows into what it was like in her role at the time.
Another thing I was thinking about throughout the listen was, is the author trying to push an anti-Elon narrative? I am a Musk hater. And have proudly been a hater since the mid 2010s. Despite this, coming into this read I was worried that Schiffer would be biased, and fail to challenge me on my assumptions.
I felt that the beginning of the narrative presented things fairly, yet eventually Schiffer became comfortable plainly stating that Musk was a bad actor, who was harming humanity and the company. This gradual change (in my biased opinion) was well deserved, as Schiffer lays out an accurate case on why Elon deserves to be hated, rather than starting from that assumption from the beginning.
I would recommend the audiobook read by Jamie Lamchick, who gives a real voice to Schiffer’s POV. This is a must read, and I would recommend it to anyone!
As a Twitter user who experienced a lot of the milestones Schiffer talks about, hearing the boardroom deals, slack messages, and emails behind them is fascinating. I loved how Schiffer brought in her personal perspective as a journalist, giving us little windows into what it was like in her role at the time.
Another thing I was thinking about throughout the listen was, is the author trying to push an anti-Elon narrative? I am a Musk hater. And have proudly been a hater since the mid 2010s. Despite this, coming into this read I was worried that Schiffer would be biased, and fail to challenge me on my assumptions.
I felt that the beginning of the narrative presented things fairly, yet eventually Schiffer became comfortable plainly stating that Musk was a bad actor, who was harming humanity and the company. This gradual change (in my biased opinion) was well deserved, as Schiffer lays out an accurate case on why Elon deserves to be hated, rather than starting from that assumption from the beginning.
I would recommend the audiobook read by Jamie Lamchick, who gives a real voice to Schiffer’s POV. This is a must read, and I would recommend it to anyone!
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