Twitter Employees React to Being 'Thanos Snapped' as Half of Workers Fired

Twitter employees have been speaking out on the social media app, after learning they have likely been fired.

On Thursday Twitter, now owned by Elon Musk, announced it would begin mass layoffs on Friday.

Some employees have already lost access to internal Twitter accounts, leading them to believe they've been fired.

On Thursday evening Rumman Chowdhury, listed on LinkedIn as a Twitter director of machine learning ethics, posted a photograph of her failing to sign in to her Twitter email, with an error message revealing: "Your password was changed less than an hour ago."

She later added: "It's already started—just had the honor of being thanos snapped."

Chowdhury is referencing a scene in 2018 Marvel movie Avengers: Infinity War, when protagonist Thanos snaps his fingers, causing half of all life in the universe to disintegrate.

Daniel Goldberg described himself as a Twitter project manager, working on the company's "global politics content classification strategy," on LinkedIn, though now says he "worked at Twitter" in his Twitter 'bio.'

In an apparent swipe at Musk, who purchased Twitter for $44 billion, Goldberg tweeted: "I think he just paid $44B to stop having his dumb texts released?"

Twitter has told employees it will let them know by email on Friday whether they are being laid off.

Elaine Filadelfo, who describes herself as a Twitter senior research manager at the company on LinkedIn, took aim at company founder Jack Dorsey.

Court documents published in September revealed Dorsey had tweeted Musk claiming Twitter "should never have been a company."

Trenton Kennedy, Twitter's U.S. policy communications manager between November 2019 and August 2022, tweeted: "Lmao [laugh my a** off] the way @jack [Dorsey} played all of us is INSANE."

Filadelfo replied: "'Shouldn't be a company' after making billions from turning it into a company, then firing all the people who made you the billions."

London-based Chris Younie, who describes himself as a "senior manager entertainment partnerships at Twitter," tweeted he was unable to log in to company accounts.

He said: "Well this isn't looking promising. Can't log into emails. Mac wont turn on.

"But so grateful this is happening at 3am. Really appreciate the thoughtfulness on the timing front guys.

"Meanwhile to everyone else at Twitter, you're the best."

Newsweek has contacted Twitter for comment.

After taking over Twitter, Musk suggested users will be able to pay $8 for a blue verification badge, and associated benefits, though the details are unclear.

The world's richest man tweeted: "Twitter's current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn't have a blue checkmark is b*******. Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.

"Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity."

Former President Donald Trump praised Musk on Truth Social, his own social media platform, after the Twitter purchase was completed.

He commented: "I am very happy that Twitter is now in sane hands, and will no longer be run by Radical Left Lunatics and Maniacs that truly hate our country."