19 ms·
Twitter Office Supply Auction
- jp0d 4y agoAre they getting rid off some of the creature comforts for the employees who're still sticking around? I could be wrong but is it another way Elon thinks that he could improve efficiency? Probably overthinking!
- largepeepee 4y agoI think it's more like having downsized by half, they now have lots of excess unused inventory to offload.
- ekianjo 4y ago> Are they getting rid off some of the creature comforts for the employees who're still sticking around? In case you haven't noticed the majority of employees has been fired. There's only so many sofas you need for a certain amount of people.
- kzrdude 4y agoSelling off a twitter bird statue makes it look bad. What a signal that the company doesn't believe in itself anymore.
- phendrenad2 4y agoI see it as a commitment to removing the old way of doing things, and starting fresh. Also it's common for companies to erect monuments to their own worship, but only once they've had lots of success and have money to burn. It isn't clear that the new twitter will succeed, and everyone knows it.
- bhouston 4y agoIf you have less offices you have less needs for corporate branding. If you were to consolidate all branding into the remaining offices it would take up too much space. You can not be sentimental about this stuff.
- lawn 4y agoBut you can be smart and care about branding and reputation. Throwing them away would be more beneficial.
- tkiolp4 4y agoIf there is only one thing business and companies should be sentimental about is about their origins. No room for sentimental stuff when doing anything else. Twitter is employing humans and the end of the day, not robots.
- rtpg 4y agoI imagine there are still plenty of statues all over.
- Consultant32452 4y agoTo be fair, Twitter is also employing a lot of robots.
- lupire 4y agoThe new owner is opposed to Twitter's origins, and his goal is to employ robots, not humans.
- marbu 4y agoRight, but when it comes to their branding stuff, I would expect the company to either store it (if they have enough space somewhere) or move it straight to trash. Selling their corporate logos for 25 USD looks like they are being liquidated and closing the shop. I can't understand how someone even come up with such idea ...
- Closi 4y agoCompanies do this sort of stuff all the time. Loads of companies sell merch, and even very brand-sensitive companies will sell old equipment for fans/nostalgia (see: Disneyland selling old animatronics and ride vehicles). They aren't selling it for 25 USD anyway, it's a start price at an auction. I listed my iPad at a $0.01 start price, but that doesn't mean I'm broke and need the penny :)
- LightG 4y agoI heard they need the space to replace it with this: https://edition.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/12/02/elon-goat-token-statue-elon-musk-cprog-orig-ht.cnn-business https://edition.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/12/02/elon-goat... (ultimate ... infinite ... cringe)
- neilv 4y agoThat's strangely befitting.
- arkitaip 4y agoMusk doesn't seem to believe in this version of Twitter and therefore has no issues dismantling it. There's still lots of damage done to Twitter the employer but I don't think it matters in the long run: there are always suckers who are willing to work for despotic leaders.
- Denvercoder9 4y agoOr people on H-1B visas that can't take the risk of leaving.
- arkitaip 4y agoApologies I forgot about those people, who really are in a vulnerable position.
- tjpnz 4y agoI'm surprised nobody walked out the door with it as a trophy. It's not unusual for things to go missing when a company goes through an acquisition.
- somehnacct3757 4y agoThere is one lot of 10 jamboard stands, which makes you wonder where 10 jamboards went
- danielfoster 4y agoI’m sure Elon is checking the cameras. Taking items is a great way to turn a layoff into a for-cause firing.
- INTPenis 4y agoI'm not one of Elon's fans, trust me on that. But I do enjoy different perspectives to things. And this sure seems like Elon doesn't give a f*ck about people, he's honestly trying to assemble the smallest team necessary to keep Twitter going, in whatever direction he wants it to go. So yeah he's gotten a lot of criticism but I believe there's a different perspective here of a ruthless businessman just doing anything he wants to save his 44bn investment. Including downsizing it to the bare minimum, and then rewarding the people who stuck around and helped him through it.
- nr2x 4y agoHe's "assembled" a team of H1Bs who can't quit, but he comes from apartheid money so it's just the old family business model redux.
- TheHappyOddish 4y ago> He's "assembled" a team of H1Bs who can't quit So the (still after weeks) unsubstantiated rumours say...
- nr2x 4y agoI heard this from multiple sources of my own.
- TheHappyOddish 4y agoDo you not feel this would be big news if accurate? I'd imagine a lot of media outlets would love to break this story and would be hunting for any source of this, of which there would be hundreds.
- Krisjohn 4y agoIt's also a security risk. Get ahold of enough branded stuff and you can make people think you work at Twitter on a video call.
- ShivShankaran 4y agoI am struggling to think how Elon is going to pay the interest on the loan he took for buying Twitter. On other hand his collateral , tsla stock, is crashing. He got carried away to make this purchase during the rising tide of covid bull market. I suspect this is going to severely affect both tsla and twtr
- criddell 4y agoBefore launching a GoFundMe for Elon, consider that when it’s that much money Elon doesn’t really have a problem, the bankers do. No matter what happens, Elon is going to be just fine.
- LightG 4y agoOnly if you consider that your reputation doesn't matter ... (and I mean beyond just the 'yes people')
- metadat 4y agoIn this instance, the guys reputation is already trash binned.
- ohbtvz 4y agoThat's a nice saying, but it does not really hold true. Sure, banks aren't going to repossess Musk's house or anything like that. But they will recover what they're owed, in some form or the other. That's pretty much all that they do, all day, every day.
- pavlov 4y agoApparently he’s looking to replace some of the expensive debt with new margin loans backed by his TSLA shares: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-08/musk-bankers-mull-tesla-margin-loans-to-cut-risky-twitter-debt https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-08/musk-bank... IMO this Twitter deal has been nothing but bad news for Tesla shareholders. The CEO is completely distracted and forced to sell his shares, and the company has been dragged into stupid culture wars. Tesla brand perception has crashed among Democratic-voting Americans who previously were its biggest supporters. It’s hard to believe he spent $44B and crashed his car company’s valuation and personal reputation just to bring back Babylon Bee’s trans harassment onto an also-ran social media platform. It’s even harder to believe that some people fantasize about moving to a Mars colony where a person with this kind of judgment is king.
- denton-scratch 4y agoA lot of that stuff doesn't seem to be "office supplies". There's quite a lot of pro kitchen equipment in there. It looks as if they've broken down a big office canteen.
- bombcar 4y agoThey famously shut down the free meals.
- sio8ohPi 4y agoThat's wild. It's untaxed comp that minimizes the time employees need to spend thinking about food during the day. He's mandating employees come back to the office for long hours, but now they need to (at least) order and receive their own lunches and dinners? If he's trying to retain some sort of high-intensity hardcore ninja startup bullshit, I would think free food would be the last thing cut. Or is he planning for them to subsist on nothing but soylent? I've not been impressed by Musk, but this feels like the most boneheaded thing I've heard about his management yet.
- kgantchev 4y ago> That's wild. It's untaxed comp... So tax evasion?
- sokoloff 4y agoTax avoidance at most.
- rsynnott 4y ago… No. Many jurisdictions, provided that certain rules are followed, allow employers to provide food for employees on premises without it being deemed a benefit in kind (ie taxable). Some go further. I believe in France employers can still give employees vouchers (in practice run over the debit card system these days) for restaurants, and this is also not deemed a benefit in kind. A lot of this sort of thing is down to long-standing practice, really. It has long been customary for many employers to feed their staff, so this isn’t considered a benefit in kind.
- SilverBirch 4y agoThis is pretty unsurprising, they're not really going to raise any serious money from this (what do we reckon? 1FTE Salary at most?) but they've got office space for 7.5k people and less than 3k less. Musk keeps saying "If you code come to the 10th floor" - which basically implies that their entire team of engineers fit onto 1 floor of the building and that there a load of empty floors now that don't need kitchens or desks or chairs.
- gonzo41 4y agoWouldn't it just be smarter to sublet the space and fill up the building. Rather than having empty floors on a building you barely use.
- defrost 4y agoThere's more than the whiff of a move to Texas in the wind.
- LightG 4y agoBy the time they make the move, they'll be able to fit all the staff in a campervan. They can take a road trip over to Texas.
- uwuemu 4y ago
- yreg 4y agoWhy is the sibling comment flagged and dead?
- zimpenfish 4y agoAt a minimum, I'd suggest "office freeloaders" and "energy vampires" are indicative of someone not commenting in good faith.
- tonetheman 4y agoThey have to make room for the beds. Hardcore twitter demands you sleep at work.
- someweirdperson 4y agoNot (while) at work of course, but in the office!
- sgt 4y agoNew twitter allows from working from home as well, now that your office is your new home.
- mikeryan 4y agoHoming from work?
- pickingdinner 4y agoI would love to have a twitter bird. Only because it's the carcass of its older self. Really wish they update the logo soon. To imagine this is even news. Most companies get rid of their stuff all the time in many different ways, mostly discretely and with absolutely no interest from the public, which result in the same thing. No news. But Elon has learned the Trump card. Any news is attention, and the game isn't in good vs evil, moral vs immoral, tyrant vs iron man. It's being in the news, and making people debate exactly that. And since hate travels broader and faster than praise, at least on social media, here we are. Negativity First™
- nemo44x 4y agoThis reminds of the .com crash days so much. There were endless auctions and sales of office furniture, etc. I don’t even think a lot of it got sold as demand was so low and supply so high. I heard stories of people buying chairs that cost $1k for $25, etc.
- chasd00 4y agoyeah remember when the herman miller aeron was the ultimate .com status symbol? After the bust you could find those on the side of the road for a while.
- nemo44x 4y agoThey really are damn fine chairs.
- megax 4y agoAgreed. I don’t require much but I can’t go without my Aeron
- EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK 4y agoThat's probably SF thing. Generally corporate America swears by Steelcase.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- sethd 4y agoDoveBid was a good auction site for this stuff back then, IIRC.
- QuadmasterXLII 4y agoA useful comparison for discussion:reddit has 700 employees and twitter had 7000.
- staindk 4y agoYeah I think general consensus is that twitter was bloated and I'm guessing a lot of people were skimming by not doing much (or stuck doing things that amounted to not much). Elon's methodology isn't the best way forward though. Ugh idk.
- TheHappyOddish 4y ago> Elon's methodology isn't the best way forward though. Ugh idk. People keep saying this, but I'm yet to see the fire the smoke implies.
- themitigating 4y ago"Yeah I think general consensus is that twitter was bloated and I'm guessing a lot of people were skimming by not doing much " Based on what?
- staindk 4y agoTheir number of devs combined with how the platform has looked/felt the same for 10 straight years?
- mythhouse 4y agoI worked at twitter's data engineering org in 2018. It was the most relaxed work culture I've experienced. Great WLB ( code for its ok to coast) . Spent my winters working from ski resorts and ski lodges. My mental and physical health were at all time high.
- elygre 4y agoWhy is “great WLB” code for “ok to coast”? What does one write for actual great WLB, without the coasting?
- huhtenberg 4y agoDamn, a prosciutto slicer! https://www.bidspotter.com/en-us/auction-catalogues/heritage-global-partners/catalogue-id-herita10194/lot-77c093bd-9dc0-4f8d-914a-af6401169064 https://www.bidspotter.com/en-us/auction-catalogues/heritage... This auction is clearly not for just the _office_ supplies, but still.
- capableweb 4y agoOn that topic, the fridges and freezers currently have bids lower than the fucking tables, which is insane. Those are way worth way more than the current bids at 25 USD. Edit: seems I misunderstood and it's just the opening bids, the bidding hasn't started yet. Still strange that the opening bids are higher for a table than restaurant-style fridges/freezers.
- Closi 4y agoNone of the auctions are open for bidding - you are just looking at the start price.
- mstade 4y agoThose are just the starting bids. Bidding doesn't open until mid January, I think.
- bombcar 4y agoThe opening bids on auctions are almost always meaningless and set very low - the auction company knows that the valuable items will be bid up fast enough, and they do NOT want anything left over because then they have to dispose of it. Why some are 25 and some are 50 I'm not sure; they may raise the bid a bit on items they think might not get many bids.
- nomdep 4y agoMaybe it was set by someone has bought projectors and chair in the past but has no idea how fricking expensive is a large fridge
- 4y ago
- lzaaz 4y ago
- speedgoose 4y agoEurope is catching up on the obesity rate.
- capableweb 4y agoAccording to what data? Here is a map I came across recently (with references that checks out): https://i.redd.it/3tmf1l3g38n91.png https://i.redd.it/3tmf1l3g38n91.png From https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/xbh97v/obesity_rates_in_the_us_vs_europe_oc/ https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/xbh97v/obe...
- speedgoose 4y agoI haven’t searched for all Europe but here are two sources about Norway and France: https://www.fhi.no/en/op/hin/health-disease/overweight-and-obesity-in-norway---/ https://www.fhi.no/en/op/hin/health-disease/overweight-and-o... https://liguecontrelobesite.org/actualite/taille-poids-et-tour-de-taille-photographie-2020-des-francais/ https://liguecontrelobesite.org/actualite/taille-poids-et-to...
- Jensson 4y agoYou said Europe is catching up, that requires Europe to increase obesity faster than USA. But to me it looks like USA is still growing fatter faster than Europe, so according to these graphs Europe will never catch up to American obesity levels. And it will take about 20 years for current Europe to catch up to todays US obesity levels, that isn't very quick either, 20 years is half a career, and at that point USA will be even worse. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/Obesity_in_the_United_States.svg/1200px-Obesity_in_the_United_States.svg.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/Ob...
- 4y ago
- qwezxcrty 4y agoSome NEC laser projectors looks nice, want to bid on one if shipping to Europe is possible.
- bombcar 4y agoYou could bid but I dare say they'll sell for more than they're worth if you include shipping to Europe.
- awiesenhofer 4y agoLooking at all these Google Jamboards for sale makes me think, anyone using a Jamboard, Surface Hub or similar at home or for wfh?
- m3drano 4y agoI use a Jamboard regularly. Pretty cool device for meetings over Meet (and rather well integrated into the Workspace suite).
- wildrhythms 4y agoAt a previous employer on GSuite we had directors and other higherups demand Jamboards for their office space as a dedicated device to take meetings from.
- influx 4y agoI always think about the $10,000 couch in the lobby of the Seattle Twitter office that no one ever sat on. Twitter wasted money on shit that didn’t matter for years.
- cyberpunk 4y ago10k is really not that much for a lobby worthy couch…
- ThePadawan 4y ago10k doesn't even buy you 2 Barcelona chairs. And those aren't even comfortable.
- influx 4y agoThe point is they didn’t need any couch there. Or could have gotten something comfortable from ikea and maybe wouldn’t have had to sell their company to Elon and had all this useless shit auctioned off.
- maxerickson 4y agoTwitter didn't sell out of desperation, the offer was way above what the company was worth. A court was on the cusp of forcing the deal through when it finally moved forward. So think of it as a $15,000 couch being liquidated.
- influx 4y agoTell that to all my colleagues who don’t have a job anymore.
- lern_too_spel 4y agoThey wouldn't have a job even if the Seattle office had a futon rescued from a garbage bin instead of a $10k couch.
- 147 4y agoDo they ship? I can’t find any details.
- dbrgn 4y agoSome nice espresso machines and grinders listed there. I assume those won't sell for 25$.
- bgentry 4y agoI wonder what those will go for. The triple La Marzocco goes for >$20k new and the singles about $9-10k: https://prima-coffee.com/equipment/la-marzocco/strada-ee-la-ma-pp https://prima-coffee.com/equipment/la-marzocco/strada-ee-la-... https://www.espressoparts.com/products/la-marzocco-linea-classic-s-1-group-ee-semi-automatic-espresso-machine https://www.espressoparts.com/products/la-marzocco-linea-cla...
- Finnucane 4y agoI’m half tempted to bid to find out. Shipping probably won’t be cheap either. And there’s no way to know what the condition is.
- giraffe_lady 4y agoI expect all the kitchen equipment will go for market value and no less. There's literally an entire little industry in every mid-size city or larger of people who keep an eye on restaurant closures and snatch up the equipment. That includes any business big enough to have an institutional kitchen so they'll definitely be on this one. Most new restaurants open with mostly used equipment and it comes from things like this.
- bombcar 4y agoYep. The only way to get a deal on an auction like this is to bid on something nobody wants (maybe the Twitter thing?) or be willing to travel to an auction so far from the city nobody has bothered. And that’s damn far, as the used resellers will have a truck.
- rsynnott 4y agoNo, definitely not. Commercial kitchen equipment is expensive even second-hand; these will be bid up.
- tapanjk 4y agoPure speculation on my part but hard not to think that they are preparing to move the HQ someplace else.
- MontyCarloHall 4y agoOut of curiosity, why announce this auction so early? Bidding doesn’t start for over a month.
- ncr100 4y agoI think: Wanting an honest group of bidders, likely other businesses .. should not rush them .. give them time to organize. There is no warranty with these products so it's a headache to acquire, and a business may need time to plan that out.
- uxp100 4y agoGives you time to arrange a time to come in for inspection. Pretty typical for commercial auctions I think. This one is a little more interesting than most. Commercial kitchen gear is maybe the most common thing I see, but usually someone would have taken home stuff like the bird or the at planter, anything fun or with branding usually doesn’t make it to the auction. Signed, Someone who wanted unique branded items from a well known local brewery that went under, but just read through 20 pages of “Lot of 100 spoons” instead.
- blamazon 4y agoThat's common for auctions. It allows time for hype to build, the link to be sent around, interested parties to accumulate.
- adalacelove 4y agoI would bid for the sink
- qwertyuiop_ 4y agoSurprising the system appears to run efficiently without the extra 7000 employees.
- yreg 4y agoElon didn't fire _everyone_ so the delta is less than 7k. Still, has it been long enough to evaluate that? The missing employees might be noticeable once there is some big issue with the infra and all the greybeards are gone, or once there is some big EU investigation and all the compliance experts are gone, etc.
- swozey 4y agoHere's the Twitter Death Watch grafana that's tracking API response times, etc https://deadbird.singlepane.io/ https://deadbird.singlepane.io/
- zimpenfish 4y ago> some big EU investigation and all the compliance experts are gone AFAIK the compliance experts are gone and they have an FTC audit in January.
- TMWNN 4y agoTwitter was supposed to have collapsed and died a month ago, but seems to be working well enough during the current mega world event known as the FIFA World Cup.
- philliphaydon 4y agoI feel like the more we learn about Twitter the more it’s just a tiny company that tried to look like Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Apple. It’s really just a trash company that had a lot of junk and a lot of people doing nothing with overly inflated salaries.
- kzrdude 4y agoWhy is twitter trash? Problems are pointed out with all those four large companies way more often than with twitter. Maybe smaller companies with smaller scope are in fact more productive, effective and less problematic rather than the opposite.
- whywhywhywhy 4y ago>Why is twitter trash? We can prove it objectively with how history played out. What’s the biggest, most influential and main social network of the next 10 years that every legacy network is desperately trying to imitate? Well Twitter owned the concept a decade ago and didn’t think it was worth taking any further so now someone else reaped the benefits. “Trash” isn’t a strong enough word.
- philliphaydon 4y agoBecause it was over valued and produced nothing. 7000 employees. Moderation didn’t actually enforce rules. Nothing changed in 10 years. 0 attempt at fixing issues. Killed off vine with no attempt to make it better.
- gardenhedge 4y agoI thought we all had the consensus this whole time? It's never even had half the userbase that Facebook has had. It hasn't innovated in years. The web interface is awful to use. It hasn't been able to get any traction on any other product (vine etc).
- stiltzkin 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- j-bos 4y agoFor those interested in buying but not in SF, you'll need to arrange your own pickup, craigslist style: "Buyers may either pick up Goods at the designated auction site themselves or can contract with a third party agent to manage the removal process for them."
- jiveturkey 4y agothese type of commercial auctions always offer a captive/partner transporter if you want that. i haven’t looked at the auction but presumably some of the items are large are require rigging and you’d generally use their partner. > Additional Information Regarding Removal Procedures and Logistics Will Be Provided in January, 2023
- mindslight 4y agoYeah, this isn't eBay. Caveat emptor, as-is where-is, FOB where it sits, payment by wire only, be happy if you can load out yourself. One would think there would be some times when the lots are open to inspection. It looks like bidding ends on Jan 17th, so there's plenty of time for them to add that.
- j-bos 4y agoAccording to the documentation you can view the items by appointment only.
- s5300 4y agoPurging that many espresso machines… guess they’ve chosen the path of purely amphetamines…
- gardenhedge 4y agoAnyone know if the Dublin office is selling anything?
- tennisflyi 4y agoRetail price for that furniture is appalling.
- longtimelistnr 4y agoWell it’s not the type of furniture you ever have to throw away. Real molded plywood furniture will last forever
- justinclift 4y agoHeh, quite a few 60" LED TV's in there, with starting bid price of US$50. ;)
- phendrenad2 4y agoHow are the middle-managers and scrumlords going to monitor the jenkins runs?
- stiltzkin 4y ago
- jacooper 4y agoLink without a unique tracking ID https://twitter.com/DogeEastwood/status/1600891540930715649 https://twitter.com/DogeEastwood/status/1600891540930715649
- joshstrange 4y agoEmployee uses employee perks... what is there to see here other than not-so-thinly-veiled sexism?
- stiltzkin 4y agoSo much perks for so little work.
- yucky 4y agoWhat sexism?
- joshstrange 4y agoIt’s a tweet that says “Wonder Why” while posting a video of a female who worked at Twitter showing off all the perks. It’s in response to a tweet: > JUST IN: Elon Musk's Twitter has been sued for "disproportionately" firing female employees. The person who posted video is very clearly saying “See, they weren’t fired because they were women, they were fired because they didn’t do any work” but the video doesn’t show/prove that at all. Just because someone uses the perks doesn’t mean they don’t work but people are jumping to that conclusion and this is all in the context of the first tweet (women being disproportionately laid off) so it’s pretty clear that sexism is at play in this thread (especially if you read the replies).
- andrewmcwatters 4y agoDarn! I was hoping their excess and vanity was rich enough to warrant them buying Aeron chairs. Who wants a Generation by Knoll? I guess I'll just buy my own.
- pjbeam 4y agoI finally did in '21 and it was worth every penny. YMMV but my attitude on price vs value for high end chairs changed quite a bit when I got one.
- ipaddr 4y agoLike I really want a $25 used La Marzocco LINEA 1EE Semi-Auto Espresso Machine filled with the tears of the forker compliance team.