Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak took Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta to task following a Post report on the company yanking offers from would-be interns.
Wozniak, who created the first Apple computers alongside Steve Jobs, appeared to question Meta’s honor in a tweet on Wednesday.
“When COVID prevented our house workers from coming, Janet and I made the sacrifice to continue paying their full salaries because it was the right thing to do,” Wozniak wrote with a link to a news story about Meta canceling internships.
The Post first reported on Wednesday that Meta has started rescinding coveted internship offers from would-be “Metamates.”
The interns were set to work in Meta’s London offices starting in January 2023. Many were notified by email that their internships had been canceled, according to a source familiar with the situation.
The nixed London internships are part of expected global cuts to the number of interns Meta hires around the world next year. It’s unclear whether Meta expects to go forward with its US internships, which typically begin in the summer.
The internship cutbacks come as Zuckerberg aggressively reduces costs and reportedly seeks to slash thousands of employees from Meta’s payroll through “quiet layoffs.”
The company also announced a hiring freeze last week.
“Meta interns are crucial in shaping our future,” company spokesperson Andrea Beasley said. “This difficult decision was not made lightly and was made as a last resort. This companywide hiring shift is to ensure that our hiring targets are aligned with our highest-priority efforts and business needs.”
Many would-be London interns said they had turned down other opportunities to accept offers from Meta months ago.
“I changed plans and discarded another offers for 2023 due to this offer, so if anyone can help me with another opportunities for the next year, I would be glad to apply,” one man who said his internship offer was revoked wrote on LinkedIn this week.
“Sometimes life is not fair and unexpected things happen,” he added.
[Written in collaboration with other media outlets with information from the following sources]
