Block, the owner’s of Tidal, are laying off circa 50% of their workers. Apparently due to the expected impact of AI….
Its shares rose by more than 20% in extended trading after the announcement, let’s hope the staff about to lose their jobs have generous share options to cash in.
ATB, J
I wonder how much Spotify Lossless launch also played a part.
Probably not a lot, the parent company Block is laying off 40% across the group which includes Square and CashApp as well as Tidal. Block’s founder Jack Dorsey said that AI “fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company” and went on to say that other companies will have to do the same.
yep it’s already starting to happen. Ai is being used by big tech to get rid of its employees. It wasn’t long ago that they were assuring us that we’re paranoid, and that it won’t happen.
I wonder who is going to buy the tech and services from these Ai driven companies when half the population will be redundant and won’t be able to afford their mortgage/rent and food.
fun days ahead indeed.
I would take what a company says when they fire people with a grain of salt. For one thing they don’t mention that their overextended during the pandemic (something Apple, for example, refused to do) and basically, it was possibly bad planning and second, they might not be representative of other companies. I am not saying AI won’t be disruptive (although it’s anyone’s guess how disruptive it will be at this point), I am saying that taking at face value what CEOs are saying is never a good idea, as they have an agenda when they talk and you don’t know what the agenda is (it could be avoiding looking bad to the investors). Just my take.
Indeed. The trades are actually reporting that Block were hemorrhaging money and the RIF is purely because of that and AI is a convenient cover story.