Elon Musk says he'll change Twitter voting rules after poll said he should step down
After a majority of respondents to one of Elon Musk's polls concluded that the Twitter CEO should step down and let someone else run the company, Musk said he plans to change the rules of who can vote.
Musk, whose affinity for Twitter polls is perhaps second only to his penchant for tweeting memes, on Sunday asked users if he should step down as CEO of Twitter, saying he would abide by the results. A majority of respondents — 57% of the 17 million who voted— answered that he should.
Shortly after, Musk tweeted: "As the saying goes, be careful what you wish, as you might get it."
Among his many polls, Musk had previously run a vote on whether to reinstate former President Donald. The "yes" vote won, with 51.8%.
"The people have spoken. Trump will be reinstated. Vox Populi, Vox Dei," Musk tweeted at the time, using a Latin phrase meaning "the voice of the people, the voice of God."
After a ban on links to other social media platforms infuriated users, the billionaire had vowed not to make any major Twitter policy changes without polling.
Some users responded to the CEO poll warning Musk that polls are susceptible to being skewed by bots. One user suggested that only paying Twitter subscribers should be allowed to vote in polls, saying, "we have skin in the game."
"Good point," Musk replied. "Twitter will make that change."
Twitter Blue is a paid subscription program that is part of Musk's plan to revamp the money-losing company and change its reliance on ads.
Musk has not formally addressed the question of whether he'll step down. The billionaire, who also runs Tesla and SpaceX, has complained about the challenges of running the company, which he bought for $44 million this year after a protracted legal battle.
"You have to invest your life savings in Twitter and it has been in the fast lane to bankruptcy since May," he said.
"There is no successor"
He later tweeted, "No one wants the job who can actually keep Twitter alive. There is no successor."
Twitter last week banned a number of accounts that track celebrity private jets using publicly available information, including the popular account ElonJet, which specifically tracked Musk's private plane.
Musk claimed that such activity amounted to doxxing, or revealing identifying details about a person. Soon after, Twitter blocked links to rival social media websites, including Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, Tribel, Nostr, Post and former President Donald Trump's Truth Social. Twitter gave no explanation for why the blacklist included those seven websites but not others such as Parler, TikTok or LinkedIn.
Twitter said it would temporarily suspend accounts that include the banned websites in their profile, but the practice is so widespread it would have affected millions of Twitter users around the world.
- Twitter suspends accounts of several journalists with no explanation
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- San Francisco building inspectors to investigate bedrooms at Twitter HQ
A test case was the prominent venture capitalist Paul Graham, who in the past has praised Musk but on Sunday told his 1.5 million Twitter followers that this was the "last straw" and to find him on Mastodon. Graham's Twitter account was promptly suspended, and soon after restored, as Musk promised to reverse the policy implemented just hours earlier.
