Employee revolt and failing agents forced Meta to scrap its AI layoff plan
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Meta reportedly planned to replace a much larger portion of its workforce with AI than was previously known, under an internal initiative called 'Project OT' that aimed to shrink many teams by up to 60 percent and leave remaining work to small groups supervising virtual AI workers. According to Reuters, CEO Mark Zuckerberg halted the second wave of layoffs planned for November just hours before the first round was set to begin on the evening of May 19. The reversal was driven by several factors: the agent technology failed to deliver expected productivity gains, investors criticized Meta's massive AI budget, and employees openly revolted. Anger intensified when workers suspected that tracking software logging mouse clicks and keystrokes was being used to train their own AI replacements, prompting a flood of protest posts on Meta's internal network. Internal sentiment reportedly dropped from 74 to 55 percent, and in July Zuckerberg admitted the agent technology had not accelerated as quickly as he had expected.
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