Death By Twitter: PayPal Edition

The editions of "Death By Twitter" never cease to amaze me. In this edition, we highlight Rakesh "Rocky" Agrawal, a Silicon Valley big-wig and (former) PayPal executive.

His issues played out over the weekend and Monday as he basically insulted half his co-workers over Twitter. It seems from his "slurred typing" that alcohol was involved in these tweets, not to mention that he was at Jazz Fest in New Orleans!

With the lines between our personal lives and our work lives becoming ever more blurred, it has almost become run-of-the-mill to see these Twitter Fails come back to bite workers out of their jobs!

But they do always have twists and turns! As usual, most of the offending tweets have been removed from Agrawal's Twitter page (@rakeshlobster), but he continues to mention the debacle and his tweets since then have played out like a weird cryptic play that just keeps going downhill. First, there is the issue that he claims he quit while PayPal claims they fired him. Here is the tweet describing that:

"Oh. I quit pay a tonight because of self at son and aortic and ah our and hill e a s th"

Yeah, those typos are not my doing! That is literally what the tweet says. Like I mentioned, the man was having some fun at Jazz Fest. But the minute that happens is when he should put away the phone!! Things have drawn out to some quite serious claims like:

"Friends are worrying about me committing suicide. My colleagues have deserted me. Friends are flying in from across country."

I hope he is okay. But I also hope that we can get past this junior-high mentality of venting to our Twitter feeds and keep the site for more value-adding information! Still, kudos to PayPal for their brief tweet, at least referencing the issue and the company's stance on it: Rakesh Agrawal is no longer with the company. Treat everyone with respect. No excuses. PayPal has zero tolerance.

This leads me to think about Twitter and if I've ever posted something I wish I hadn't. Nothing is coming to mind, but I bet it happens to many. Have you ever wanted to take back a tweet??

Death By Twitter: #USAirways OMG!

It has been awhile, guys. We haven't had a "Death By Twitter" entry in a few months.

Well, we sure do today. And warning, the content of this, or googling it further, will be NSFW! (For those acronym illiterate that is NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!)

We're gonna keep it PG on this site, though- don't worry!

Okay, so if you haven't seen online, what I am alluding to is the recent US Airways tweet in which a customer service rep was responding to a customer complaint and instead of posting a link to a survey, posted a link to a lewd image. And I'm not talking any lewd image. I'm talking nudity, explicit and dealing with airplanes. I am gonna leave it at that.

This, my friends, is so over the top. It is worse than the average "Death By Twitter" in which someone makes a comment that is borderline offensive or just not well thought out. The image was posted next to the tweet for all to see. Obviously it was a mistake but not the kind of mistake that you can fix by "take an extra breath before you tweet!!"

WHY was this image even anywhere near this customer service reps' computer!? There are currently not even speculations about how this might have happened, and US Airways has launched an internal investigation to find out what the HECK happened.

Of course, they've removed the tweet and responded with a PC apology:

"We apologize for an inappropriate image recently shared as a link in one of our responses. We've removed the tweet and are investigating,"
I don't even know what else to say about this one, guys. Just that I think this is certainly the most graphic Death By Twitter that I've seen all year!  Maybe the one who posted was one of the 40% of people who hate the jobs? Or more likely one of the 10% or so who want to hurt the company they work for?  What do you think?

 

Couldn't Dr. King Have Gotten 140 Characters All To Himself??

It's kinda becoming cliche.  Every national holiday or big media event, brands tweet and try to supply relevant content about the day, mixed with a message about their brand.  Well MLK day was no different.  While there were less HUGE disasters, it seems like people are still struggling to get this right.  So, let's dig deeper into these struggles and cross our fingers that we can get it right next time!!

Struggle #1:  Squeezing yourself in, i.e. "The ME TOO!"

Example: PETA

Reason: Look, I am an animal LOVER.  Play me one of those Sara McLaughlins and I am bawling like a newborn baby.  But, newsflash, MLK day isn't about animals.  So why try to sneak your agenda in?  Can we not give Dr. King 140 characters to himself!?

Struggle #2: Making it about you, i.e. "The LOOK AT ME!"

Example: Canoe and Kayak Magazine

Reason: WHAT?! What does this even mean?  At least PETA was trying to tie themselves into the theme of hardship and struggle.  This is just lazy.  How does kayaking "honor" MLK? I don't understand.  If your content is not relevant to the day, try making it relevant to an experience.  This tweet would have made a lot more sense with "Celebrate the long weekend by checking out these dream sea kayaking trips."  Then, have a separate tweet to wish people Happy Martin Luther King Day.  Geez. 

Struggle #3: Trying too hard, i.e. "The NICE TRY"

Example: Chicken Of The Sea

Reason: This comes down to knowing your brand and having a consistent brand voice. Honestly, it's not a terrible effort by Chicken Of The Sea.  But, common.  I can't take this seriously!  The tweet seems like it is being spoken by your mascot, this blonde Barbie-like mermaid girl holding a magic wand.  So while a lovely quote, the tweet as a whole doesn't seem consistent with the lighthearted and quirky brand. 

Did you see any tweets you thought were worse than these?  Any that you particularly liked?