In the middle of the day, a software engineer in Portland, Ore., put her dog on a leash and walked down the street to a coffee shop.
It seemed like an ordinary November afternoon for a person working at a company that is owned by a man who is crazy. Ms. Solomon ordered a drink for herself and a drink for her husband. She and Bosworth went back to their homes.
She was sitting at her computer in the living room when she tried to check her account on Slack. She tried to pull up her email account. Also locked inside. She was able to see something in her inbox after logging onto her email account.
According to Ms. Solomon, your recent behavior has violated company policy. She looked at her husband and said, "I guess I don't work here anymore."
Ms. Solomon became part of a small group of media industry employees who lost their jobs this year because of using social media. Ms. Solomon challenged her boss in a series of tweets. She doesn't know if those statements caused her to lose her job or if she was just one of the 3,700 people who were laid off after Mr. Musk took ownership of the company.
When Ms. Solomon was growing up in Idaho, she didn't think she'd end up working for a company with a lot of money. She thought she would stay in her home state for the rest of her life. A friend of hers got a job at a tech company in San Francisco. Ms. Solomon was hired by a Bay Area start-up and went on to work at Medium. She began working at the micro-messaging service in December of last year.
The core services group is in charge of the platform's digital infrastructure. Her specialty was a query language. She said that after a while, Ms. Solomon was representing the social networking site at events. She began doing a lot of public speaking.
She and her husband, Mike Solomon, were given permission to work from home in October 2020. She said she was promoted to manager earlier this year and was in charge of about 10 engineers. Ms. Solomon had many opportunities to grow.
She liked the work environment. She said that it has always been about openness. We've always been very vocal inside. You didn't have to worry about repercussions if you said something.
There was a mix of silly, irreverent and earnest in Ms. Solomon's account. She posted lyrics to a love song about Diet Coke, photos of herself and her husband dressed for a fair, and links to job openings on the social networking site.
Mr. Musk said that he wanted to buy the company. Ms. Solomon was not happy with the change in ownership. There was a sign in the window of the coffee shop that said it was closed for a meeting. Ms. Solomon warned him not to buy her coffee shop.
The company's board of directors agreed with Mr. Musk. In his first public comments on the deal, he said he would reverse the permanent ban on Donald J. Trump. Mr. Musk said he hoped his critics would stay on social media, because that is what free speech is all about.
When Mr. Musk tried to walk away from the deal, Ms. Solomon kept quiet. The sale was done on October 27th. Ms. Solomon replied with a shout out to her followers.
Her work life changed the next day. She said that she and her colleagues had little or no contact with the new leadership team. Ms. Solomon said there was no communication.
The email from the generic address said that the company would go through a difficult process of reducing its global workforce. The note was written on a piece of paper. Some people at the company were told they would be laid off the next day.
Ms. Solomon and her husband went to a lounge on Clinton Street. The phones were on the table. They used their phones to chat with their work friends in London, Seattle and San Francisco. Ms. Solomon said that messages were flying across screens. She said that you were seeing your co-workers fall.
The engineers were reduced to four by the next day. Ms. Solomon and her husband were not among the many who were laid off. She was waiting for further directions from Mr. Musk or the new executive team. The only thing that came was an email telling employees that remote work would no longer be allowed.
Many employees learned of Mr. Musk's priorities by watching his feed, where he posts frequently about company business. He said that the search function on the platform reminded him of Infoseek in 1998. He wrote that it will get better soon. He said that the ability to attach long-form text to a message would be added soon.
Many of Ms. Solomon's colleagues had heard that as well. She said that she was going to use radio silence. She began to express her feelings on the social networking site.
On Nov. 6, after Mr. Musk announced a new rule for users, she wrote, "Any name change will cause temporary loss of verified checkmark." Many people had changed their names to variations of Mr. Musk and he had posted that message.
The new policy is being commented on by Ms. Solomon. If I wanted to change my name to'sach@ the combination hellsite dumpster fire', I would need to submit my proof of legal name change.
During a week of meetings on changes at the company, Ms. Solomon said that they would be scheduling multiple all-hands every day.
On Nov. 13, Mr. Musk apologized for the slowness of the service in many countries. The app is doing a lot of poorly done RPCs.
The work of Ms. Solomon and her team is related to the work of RPCs. She said in an interview that Mr. Musk's statement was incorrect. She said that it wasn't because of the reasons he said that the app was slow. We would have explained it if he had come to us and asked how it worked.
Ms. Solomon said that her boss's statement was a dig at the employees who maintain the in-house infrastructure of the social network. She said that she couldn't let that happen.
She commented on Mr. Musk's remark that he did not just layoff almost all of the infrastructure and then make a remark about how we do it. Did you know how graphqi works?
She added a second message three minutes later. She told Mr. Musk that he didn't have the right to criticize the people in charge of the infrastructure.
She said it was a bit impulsive.
Ms. Solomon was put in danger of becoming the main character of the day because of the traction she received. After walking to the coffee place, she was locked out of her work email and chat accounts.
There was a time when workers at high-profile media companies could go public on social media with complaints about what they considered to be the sexist, racist or other unfair practices of their employers. It looks like that time has passed. The relative tolerance that some employers had once extended to Twistle-blowing employees was no longer in place.
After Ms. Solomon challenged Mr. Musk in a public forum, two people who worked in media gained large followings on social media.
There were threads about pay inequity and diversity issues at the magazine. She said in a statement that she had been fired. Ms. Overbey didn't reply to questions about the article. The New Yorker wouldn't say anything.
She criticized The Post's social media policy and other aspects of its culture. She was fired in June for insubordination and violating The Post's standards. The Post and Ms. Sonmez didn't say anything.
Linda Ong, the chief executive of Cultique, a consulting firm in Los Angeles that advises companies on changing culture, said that Ms. Sonmez and Ms. Overbey were taking their concerns to a social media audience.
After George Floyd was killed, there was an employee empowerment movement that gained traction. There is pressure on corporations now that there is a possible recession. Musk is the poster boy of doubling down on capitalism.
She said, "'Wokeism' is giving way to 'bossism' - the ascension of the C-suite taking its power back from employees."
Like Ms. Overbey, Ms. Solomon lost her job because of her social media postings. She said she would say it again.
She said that she was a bit salty.
The husband woke up to an email. The company policy says that your recent behavior has violated it. He was removed from his job. He didn't say anything about Mr. Musk.
A friend of Ms. Solomon sent her a text to let her know about the account called the libs of TikTok. Mr. Musk seemed to be talking to Ms. Solomon when he replied to the Liberal Party's TikTok message. He wrote that the case was tragic.
Ms. Solomon said that she liked one champ.
Ms. Solomon said that she was let go because of her social media activity, but she didn't know why.
Ms Solomon is being represented by a labor lawyer. Ms. Solomon is one of the former employees who want to have their benefits worked out with private arbiters.
Ms. Solomon is no longer employed because of the outcome. She said it was a big deal to have that job. My younger self wouldn't have been happy. You were doing a bad job if you got fired.
She doesn't feel bad about those things.
She said she was happy about what she did. It makes sense to hold people accountable.
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