Eh... According to Wikipedia, MS had 114k employees total as of mid-2016. Given that, I'd say a 18k layoff definitely counts as a big deal.
"It's not like Nadella fired every one and started afresh." is a colloquialism. d--b was basically saying "it's not like Nadella did a major overhaul.
With which jonknee disagrees, citing a layoff of 18,000. To which simonh claims is not a major overhaul since Microsoft is nebulously enormous. To which piaste disagrees, as 18k was actually 15.7% of the company.
You can all continue to debate whether or not 15.7% is a major overhaul, whether the actual people they fired were significant, etc...
But you quoting a colloquialism and asking us all to take it literally is not helpful to the discussion, or the culture of HN.
I don't disagree, but the parent was being just as pedantic as I was. Perhaps my snark was an attempt to end the petty discussion (apparently, improperly so). Read these two statements in the context of the discussion:
> burning it down and starting from scratch.
> started afresh
15.7% is a major overhaul, but IMO in no way insinuates "burning something down" or "starting afresh". Do you think either of those statements is consistent with a 15% cut in workforce?
PS - 12,500 of those 18,000 came from Nokia[0].
> with 12,500 of those coming out of the streamlining of Microsoft’s acquired Nokia assets.
[0] - https://techcrunch.com/2014/07/17/microsoft-to-cut-workforce...