The strange conversation started when Icelandic Twitter employee Haraldur Thorleifsson asked social media if he was still working. Just over a week ago, he suddenly couldn’t log into Twitter, but no one had told him he had been fired. For nine days he tried to find out what was going on through the HR department, but no one could answer him, he wrote Guard.

That’s why Thorleifsson decided to publicly ask Twitter boss Elon Musk if he’s still working. What followed was a strange conversation, in which Musk asked the Icelander all kinds of questions and accused him of using his disability to raise money.

This is the Icelandic’s first tweet to Musk:

Thorleifsson has muscular dystrophy and is in a wheelchair. He joined Twitter in 2021 when the company, then not owned by Musk, bought his startup. In Iceland he is praised because he did not become filthy rich overnight, but instead became a Twitter employee and thus paid the Icelandic government more taxes.

‘Miscalculation’

“What work have you done?” Musk asked, among other things. And then the Twitter boss wrote about Thorleifsson: “This guy does nothing at work, says it’s because of his disability, but can send one tweet after another here”.

While the conversation is in progress, Thorleifsson will receive an email with the news that he has been fired. Late that night, Musk came in with an apology. “I want to apologize for my misjudgment of this situation. I was told things that turned out to be untrue.”

This is Musk’s apology, which follows a lengthy conversation:

“The reason I approached you so publicly is because you (or anyone else on Twitter) did not respond to my private messages,” the Icelandic wrote to Musk. “You have every right to fire me, but it would be nice if you told me.”

Thorleifsson says he wants to open a restaurant in Reykjavik now that he’s lost his job at Twitter.