The Twitter Spaces team, once comprising around 100 employees, has been downsized to just three individuals, according to reports. This follows the recent technical setbacks that unfolded during Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ ambitious attempt to announce his candidacy for the 2024 US presidential election on the popular social media app.
The highly anticipated discussion between Ron DeSantis and tech mogul Elon Musk on Twitter Spaces encountered numerous hiccups, ultimately tarnishing the announcement. With approximately 678,000 people eagerly tuning in, Twitter experienced multiple crashes, leading Musk to attribute the issues to the overwhelming number of listeners. Eventually, the Spaces session had to be restarted, attracting around 304,000 listeners.
The Spaces team, responsible for Twitter’s live audio conversations feature introduced in 2021 as a rival to Clubhouse, is now functioning with a severe lack of the institutional knowledge it had amassed over the years, it has been reported. An anonymous post on the employee forum, Blind, highlighted the alarming situation, stating that hardly anyone remaining on the team possesses a deep understanding of the current architecture.
Following the technical difficulties, entrepreneur David Sacks launched another Spaces session from his Twitter account, and Musk issued an apology, acknowledging the groundbreaking nature of the event. He stated, “I think we’re definitely breaking new ground here. As far as I know, no major presidential candidate has ever announced candidacy on social media this way. So thank you for doing that.”
Ron DeSantis, who intends to challenge Trump for the Republican nomination, may face challenges ahead as recent polls indicate he trails behind the former President. Musk had announced the interview with DeSantis a day prior to the formal declaration, expressing excitement over the unique nature of the event on social media. Musk clarified that he would not endorse any specific candidate at this time but emphasized his interest in Twitter serving as a public town square. He also revealed that the real-time questions and answers during the interview were not scripted, underscoring the spontaneous and unfiltered nature of the conversation.
