Elon Musk sacks Twitter exec who bragged of sleeping at the office amid 200 lay-offs

27 February 2023, 09:03 | Updated: 27 February 2023, 12:32

Twitter CEO Elon Musk has sacked a high-profile executive who bragged about sleeping at the office as part of the latest round of departures during his chaotic ownership of the social media giant.

Esther Crawford, who was head of Twitter Payments, was in charge of Musk's flagship plan to get users to pay for a verified "blue tick" before Musk fired her today.

She made headlines last year after she posted a picture of her sleeping at Twitter HQ as part of Musk's attempts to create a "heavy metal" working culture at the micro-blogging site.

Crawford joined the company in December 2020 and her sacking is the most high-profile of the 200 sackings which occurred over the weekend.

Musk posted a cryptic nod to the removals, calling Sunday "the first day of the rest of [their lives]".

In a post after her departure, Crawford wrote: "The worst take you could have from watching me go all-in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake.

"Those who jeer & mock are necessarily on the sidelines and not in the arena.

"I’m deeply proud of the team for building through so much noise & chaos".

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The latest firings come as the latest shake-up of Mr Musk's tumultuous spell as the companies head which began in October 2022 when he completed a drawn out $44bn takeover.

In a tweet after the takeover, addressed to advertising companies, he said: "The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilisation to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a health manner without resorting to violence.

"There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide in our society.

"He said the traditional media was in a "relentless pursuit of clicks" that catered to those extremes and that resulted in lost opportunities for dialogue.

"I didn't do it to make more money. I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love," he said.

"And I do so with humility, recognising that failure in pursuing this goal, despite our best efforts, is a very real possibility."