On May 9th, 2022, Elon Musk, CEO of Twitter, announced on Twitter that the social media platform will remove accounts that have been inactive for several years. Musk explained that this action is “important to free up abandoned handles.” He also noted that inactive accounts will be archived, but did not provide any details on when the process will begin. It is currently unknown if or how Twitter users will be able to access archived accounts.

However, Musk did mention that Twitter users may see a drop in their follower count, as several inactive accounts are likely to get removed. According to Twitter’s policy, users should log in to their account at least once every 30 days to avoid permanent removal due to inactivity.

This move comes after Twitter’s billionaire owner threatened to reassign National Public Radio’s Twitter account to another company. The public broadcaster stopped posting content to its 52 official Twitter feeds in protest against a Twitter label that implied government involvement in its editorial content.

Last month, Twitter removed the legacy verified blue tick from the profile of thousands of people, including celebrities, journalists, and prominent politicians. Musk has made account verification a part of Twitter’s Blue subscription, a move he said would tackle the issue of bot accounts.

Meanwhile, a California federal judge on May 9th, 2022, dismissed a proposed class action accusing Twitter of targeting female employees for layoffs after Musk acquired the company last year. However, the plaintiffs will be allowed to amend the lawsuit to add more details.

In other news, professional networking platform LinkedIn announced on May 9th, 2022, that it is laying off more than 700 workers and shuttering its China jobs app due to “shifts in customer behaviour and slower revenue growth.” LinkedIn, which is owned by Microsoft, indicated that the net number of job losses could be less than 500.

As part of its strategic shakeup, LinkedIn would be “opening up more than 250 new roles” in its operations team as well as new business and account management teams starting May 15th, 2022. The move by LinkedIn is the latest in a series of tech industry downsizing measures that have been taken in recent months.