Elon Musk Says He’s Stepping Down as Twitter CEO
Elon Musk asked if he should resign as CEO of Twitter earlier this week in a Twitter poll. More than half (57.5%) of the 17 million who voted in the poll voted in favor of the billionaire executive stepping down. He added, “I will abide by the results of this poll.” At first, Musk addressed the results indirectly, suggesting that future Twitter polls could be restricted to paid users of Twitter Blue, the company’s subscription service.
Musk’s poll came after a massive backlash to Twitter’s abrupt suspension of several journalists who cover him, as well as Twitter’s decision to ban, and then un-ban, links to other social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram and Mastodon, a fast-growing Twitter rival that has octupled in size since October, per CNN. Last week, Twitter suspended several journalists who had reported on Musk’s permanent ban of an account that tracked his jet.
Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022
On Tuesday night (December 20), Musk confirmed that he will step down as the company’s CEO, but only when he chooses a successor. The SpaceX founder wrote: “I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams.”
I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 21, 2022
As we’ve earlier reported, since Musk took over Twitter, mass layoffs within the company have happened. Musk forced remaining employees to take a pledge to become “extremely hardcore” in their wor and stopped enforcing Twitter’s policy against Covid-19 misinformation. When it came to the paid verification feature, Twitter launched and then un-launched after a mass influx of satirical accounts manipulated the site by impersonating public figures (including Elon), major brands and athletes.
Musk acquired Twitter in late October. Leading up to his acquisition of the social site, Musk has been clear that he wanted to revamp how Twitter verifies accounts and handles bots. Before he launched the paid verification feature, he tweeted: “The whole verification process is being revamped right now.” That didn’t age well.
