Tech News

HP Joins Tech Layoffs Season, Plans To Fire 6,000 Employees

Hewlett-Packard aka HP, the world’s leading manufacturing company of laptops and electronic devices, decided to join the huge list of tech companies that have officially confirmed mass layoffs on Tuesday.

During its earnings report, the company stated that it expected to cut 6,000 job positions by the end of the fiscal year 2025, accounting for 12 per cent of its total worldwide workforce.

“The company expects to reduce gross global headcount by approximately 4,000-6,000 employees. These actions are expected to be completed by the end of fiscal 2025,” the company said in its fiscal 2022 full-year report.
Source: wionews.com

the firm would lay off some of its almost 50,000 present employees, bit by bit over the ensuing years to save 1.4 billion USD. After HP reported reduced PC and laptop sales, the decision was made.

During the pandemic, both groups’ sales increased significantly, but since offices and schools have opened, they have levelled off.

as per the experts, this choice could have been made worse by the unfortunate economical circumstances brought on by the ongoing recession and extremely high inflation.

Due to the confluence of the aforementioned factors, the PC manufacturer predicts a lower revenue for the first quarter in its report.

“Many of the recent challenges we have seen in FY’22 will likely continue into FY’23,” said Marie Myers, chief financial officer.
Source: wionews.com

In addition, HP reported an 11 per cent decrease in Q4 sales, which came in at 14.8 billion USD, in comparison with the same quarter in 2017.

The announcement made by HP as speaking of layoffs comes as many other big tech firms, such as Amazon, Meta, and Twitter, have decreased their workforces, majorly as a result of a global recession.

In the first week after Elon Musk took control of the microblogging site, Meta fired around 11,000 people from its staff while Twitter let go of half of its workforce. Amazon, which is owned by, Jeff Bezos, has declared that it will be dismissing 10,000 of its workers.

According to various sources on Tuesday, 10,000 or 6 per cent of the poor-performing employees of Alphabet Inc., the parent firm of Google, would be dismissed.

Suhani Jain

I am a student pursuing my bachelor’s in information technology. I have a interest in writing so, I am working a freelance content writer because I enjoy writing. I also write poetries. I believe in the quote by anne frank “paper has more patience than person

Elon Musk Blames ‘Activists’ for His Twitter Moderation Council Lie

Elon Musk is trying to clarify why he allowed Donald Trump, as well as others back onto Twitter social media platform despite promising that the decision would be made by a content moderation council comprised of people with “widely diverse viewpoints”.

On Tuesday, in a tweet, he stated the council was a part of the agreement he formed with an unnamed large group of political/social activist groups, indicating it was their fault.

“A large coalition of political/social activist groups agreed not to try to kill Twitter by starving us of advertising revenue if I agreed to this condition,” he said in a tweet. “They broke the deal.” He added.
Source: business-standard.com

Musk claims he made a deal with those groups to keep them from destroying Twitter’s advertising revenue, claiming that those groups “broke the deal,” so he no longer has to defend the council.

Musk unbanned Jordan Peterson, Kathy Griffin, and The Babylon Bee earlier this month prior to actually running a poll asking his fans if people would want to see Donald Trump returned on the platform, tweeting “Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” which interprets to “the voices of the people is the voice of God.”

The following day, without mentioning the council, Elon Musk declared that Donald Trump would be reinstated based on the poll data even though the previous president and present presidential candidate has yet to resume tweeting.

It’s certainly not the first time Elon Musk has called out activists. He wrote on Twitter earlier this month that activist groups were pressuring advertisers in an attempt to obliterate free speech in America. In the meantime, The Verge has obtained documents from one of the three main advertising agencies advising clients to discontinue running campaigns on the platform.

Omnicom Media Group and others cited adherence, imitation, a lack of restraint, and how the mass layoffs will highly impact the company’s ability to operate, rather than political or social activist pressure.

Suhani Jain

Violent protests at the world’s largest iPhone factory in China

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Sandhya Gupta

Workers at the largest iPhone factory worldwide, located in Zhengzhou, central China, engaged in violent altercations early on Wednesday.

Police authorities in China have beaten up workers who were demonstrating over wages and working conditions at the largest iPhone factory, as the number of Covid-19 cases in the nation reached a new daily high.

Videos posted online showed hordes of policemen in white protective clothing and plastic riot shields facing thousands of protestors wearing masks. After a demonstrator retrieved a metal pole that was used to assault him, police struck him with clubs and kicked him. In other films, demonstrators could be seen shooting fire extinguishers at police.

In response to concerns about unsafe working conditions, thousands of employees at Foxconn, the largest contract manufacturer of cellphones and other electronics, left the facility in Zhengzhou last month, making it difficult for the company to fulfill orders for the iPhone 14.

According to an employee named Li Sanshan, demonstrations started on Tuesday when workers who had traveled great distances to accept a position at the factory claimed that the company altered the conditions of their compensation.

Foxconn apologized and said that the confusion over compensation was caused by a “technical error”. In an extraordinary move meant to placate dissatisfied new hires who were instrumental in the violent protests that shook the largest iPhone plant in the world, Foxconn has started providing 10,000 yuan to any worker who opts to quit.

The compensation, which typically exceeds a month’s pay for Foxconn’s blue-collar workers, is likely to appease some workers after they staged an unusually violent protest on Wednesday that brought attention to the negative economic and social effects of Xi Jinping’s Covid Zero plan.

The rallies are being held amid intense resentment over the Covid restrictions, which have forced millions of individuals to remain in their homes and closed businesses and offices in many parts of China. With 31,444 new infections, China on Thursday recorded the most Covid cases ever.

Despite the comparatively low numbers of infections and fatalities in comparison to other nations, China’s Communist party is nevertheless dedicated to its “zero-Covid” strategy, which strives to isolate each case and completely eradicate the virus.

By Wednesday night, the plant was operating normally, according to a statement from Foxconn. However, the demonstrations brought attention to how Xi’s program, which relies on quick lockdowns to eradicate the disease anywhere it appears, is burdening the economy and upending large portions of the entire supply chain.

The Foxconn incident serves as yet another warning to Apple about the risks of relying on a sizable production system headquartered in China in an era of unpredictable policies and shaky trade ties.

Factories like Foxconn’s, which assemble toys, consumer electronics, and other things for the global market, are the foundation of China’s position as an export powerhouse. Foxconn employees’ growing discontent poses a danger to further halting production at a facility that produces the majority of Apple’s bestselling products for export.

Apple has already issued a warning that it will supply fewer smartphones than expected during the crucial holiday quarter, and that wait periods for iPhones have gotten so long that they may extend past Christmas in some circumstances.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Elon Musk says Twitter is done with layoffs and ready to hire again

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Sandhya Gupta

Elon Musk is hiring again after firing roughly two-thirds of Twitter’s 7,500 employees in only three weeks.

According to a tweet from a The Verge reporter, Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk assured employees in an all-hands meet that the business does not expect future layoffs and is hiring for engineering and ad sales positions. Musk stated that Twitter is hiring for engineering and ad sales positions and that there are no further planned layoffs.

According to The Verge, Musk declared during the meeting that he planned to decentralize Twitter by establishing technical teams in Brazil, Japan, India, and other countries. He asserted throughout the discussion that Twitter’s technological stack has to be completely rebuilt.

Additionally, he asserted that somewhat decentralizing things is a good idea. Musk made a suggestion that engineering teams might also be established in India as part of this.

However, Twitter does not currently have any job vacancies advertised on its website, and Musk did not name the specific technical or sales positions for which the company was recruiting. During the meeting, he stated, “In terms of critical hires, I would say people who are great at writing software are the highest priority.” Last week, The Verge reported that Twitter recruiters had begun contacting engineers and inviting them to join “Twitter 2.0 — an Elon company.”

During a half-hour Q&A session with staff members from Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters, Musk claimed there are “no plans” to transfer Twitter headquarters to Texas, as he did with Tesla, but that it may make sense to have “dual-headquartered” offices in Texas and California.

Anyone joining Twitter today will do so in a far smaller organization than it was prior to Musk’s takeover. The precise number of exits during his tenure is unknown, but before he fired over half the workforce, there were almost 7,400 workers with access to Twitter’s internal systems.

Long-serving engineers, some of whom had served the company for over ten years, as well as an increasing number of corporate leaders, have left the company. On Musk’s first day, Twitter’s CEO, CFO, and chief legal officer were all fired.

The executives of Twitter’s biggest content and advertising partnerships have either left their positions or been fired. As per former and current employees, several “essential” teams were totally destroyed by the layoffs and resignations.

Another significant change is the suspension of Twitter’s $8 subscription-based “Blue Verification” mark’s re-launch. Elon Musk has also temporarily suspended the “Blue Verified” badge “until there is high confidence of stopping impersonation”.

According to Musk, the social media giant is delaying the rollout of a new system for awarding verified ticks to users and may instead employ other “colour checks” to verify businesses and people. Musk also mentioned that Twitter will soon be in a position to compete with YouTube in terms of offering a video streaming service, dropping a hint that Twitter may do so with “higher compensation for creators” and a pleasant video experience.

The new Twitter CEO today advised Twitter critics to go on other social media sites and ended his statement with the Hindi greeting “Namaste.” He tweeted,” Hope all judgy hall monitors stay on other platforms – please, I’m begging u.”

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Elon Musk puts Twitter’s Blue Verified relaunch on hold

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Suhani Jain

If you didn’t take advantage of the opportunity to give Elon Musk 7.99 USD for a blue check for your Twitter account while you could, you may even have to wait a little longer. Originally scheduled to reintroduce on November 29, Elon Musk wrote on Twitter on Monday evening that the twitter’s blue verified feature will be postponed, indefinitely, until there is a greater probability of stopping identity theft.

The initial release of Twitter Blue Verified or known as the “I-paid-Elon-$7.99” Blue Tick was a complete disaster. Obviously, the feature instantly became favourable to assist bad actors in trying to impersonate celebrities, corporate entities, and political figures.

one user account tried to imitate the drug manufacturer Eli Lilly and was announcing that insulin is free in the name of the company. Before it was removed, the tweet had been viewed a million times. The stock of the company fell 4.37 per cent.

Elon Musk went on to say that Twitter will most likely use a check of a different colour for organisations than individuals. Twitter has already experimented with using a grey official classification underneath high-profile accounts, although the feature has been turned on and off numerous times since it was first introduced.

According to The Verge, Musk also discussed working to develop features such as encoded personal messages and videoconferencing in an intrinsic presentation termed Twitter 2.0. This isn’t the first time he has mentioned implementing end-to-end encrypted DMs.

Musk insinuated that Twitter is progressing on this feature in a tweet in response to app researcher Jane Manchun Wong’s tweet, which outlined code related to that. The Twitter CEO stated earlier this month that the “goal of Twitter DM is to superset Signal.”

As some Twitter users experiment with alternative platforms such as Mastodon and Hive, Elon Musk claims that Twitter added 1.6 million monetizable daily active customers in the recent week, bringing the company’s total to 259.4 million. Notably, Musk engaged in a months-long legal battle after deeming these same metrics inaccurate in an attempt to backtrack on his Twitter purchase.

Suhani Jain

Meta rolls out new privacy updates in bid to keep teen users safe

Leave a Comment / News, Tech News / By Sandhya Gupta

New online safety precautions have been introduced by social media behemoth Meta to protect teenage users.

Last year, Meta introduced some of the steps that might be taken to keep teenagers away from possibly suspicious adults. For instance, the company forbids adults from contacting minors with whom they are not connected or from seeing adolescents in its People You May Know suggestions.

On Monday, Meta said that it would add new safeguards to its social networking sites Facebook and Instagram to safeguard young users from harm online. Facebook announced in a blog post that anybody below 16, or 18 in some regions, will now automatically have more private settings for their accounts.

The company is experimenting with additional safeguards to prevent teens from communicating with questionable adults they are not related to, and they won’t display them in the People You May Know section for teens.

The company is also completely eliminating the message button from teen Instagram profiles when they are visited by suspicious adults as an additional degree of security. According to Meta, an adult account that has lately been reported or blocked by a youngster qualifies as suspicious.

The updated tools come with more standard privacy settings and safety notifications. Some privacy options allow kids to control who may view their friends list, posts that they’re tagged in, and who can add comments on their public posts.

Meta noted, “We’re working with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to build a global platform for teens who are worried intimate images they created might be shared on public online platforms without their consent.”

In order to combat the online proliferation of self-generated personal photographs, new tools and training are also being developed. Meta is collaborating with Thorn and their NoFiltr brand to develop instructional resources that will assist youngsters in lessening the shame and stigma associated with intimate photographs.

Meta noted, “We found that more than 75% of people that we reported to NCMEC for sharing child exploitative content shared the content out of outrage, poor humor, or disgust, and with no apparent intention of harm. Sharing this content violates our policies, regardless of intent.

We’re planning to launch a new PSA campaign that encourages people to stop and think before resharing those images online and to report them to us instead.”

Teens can use a variety of tools created by Meta to inform the platform when something in one of its apps causes them to feel uncomfortable. They are encouraged to use these tools through new notifications the company has introduced.

For instance, the company sends teens safety notifications with instructions on how to deal with abusive messages from adults and prompts them to report profiles to the platform when they block someone.

Over 100 million users viewed safety notifications on Messenger in a single month in 2021. Additionally, the company has made it simpler for users to access the reporting tools. As an outcome, the company received over 70% more reports from minors, in Q1 2022 compared to Q1 2021, on Instagram DM, and Facebook Messenger.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

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