- Musk’s ownership of the social-media platform has gotten off to a tumultuous start
Elon Musk asked Twitter users to vote Sunday on whether he should step down as head of the social-media platform and pledged to abide by the results, the latest twist in what has been a tumultuous period for the company since his takeover in October.
“Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll,” Mr. Musk said in the tweet, posted to his own account. He gave users two options for a response: “Yes” or “No,” according to the tweet.
In another tweet shortly after, Mr. Musk added: “As the saying goes, be careful what you wish, as you might get it.”
Mr. Musk has led Twitter Inc. for a little over seven weeks, taking the helm after buying the social-media platform in a deal valued at $44 billion in October.
His ownership of the San Francisco-based firm has gotten off to a turbulent start, with many advertisers having paused spending, mass layoffs and resignations, and content-moderation actions that have been abrupt and controversial among many users, including reinstating former President Donald Trump’s account and disbanding Twitter’s Trust and Safety Council. Mr. Trump hasn’t tweeted since being reinstated.
The past week has been another one full of twists. Twitter suspended the accounts of several journalists, prompting criticism from some lawmakers and officials before Mr. Musk said Saturday that Twitter would begin reinstating the accounts.
Earlier Sunday, Twitter made another sudden change to its content-moderation rules, saying it would no longer allow “free promotion of certain social media platforms.” That also fueled criticism and questions, including from Twitter co-founder and former chief executive Jack Dorsey, who has previously endorsed Mr. Musk’s takeover. “Doesn’t make sense,” Mr. Dorsey tweeted Sunday.
Elon Musk’s appearance attracted attention at the World Cup final in Qatar on Sunday.Photo: Dan Mullan/Getty Images
Mr. Musk, who has said he intends to make the platform a bastion of free speech, appeared to acknowledge some concerns about the recent, abrupt content policy changes. “Going forward, there will be a vote for major policy changes. My apologies. Won’t happen again,” he tweeted shortly before posting the poll about his leadership Sunday.
Mr. Musk has warned about Twitter’s financial condition, saying this past month that the company had suffered “a massive drop in revenue” and was losing over $4 million a day. He later raised the possibility of bankruptcy.
Mr. Musk’s team this past week reached out for potential fresh investment for Twitter at the same price as the original $44 billion deal, a Twitter investor said.
Mr. Musk also is contending with investor questions about electric-car maker Tesla Inc., which he runs in addition to Twitter and rocket company SpaceX. Tesla’s stock is down more than 57% this year.
Mr. Musk this past month said he had too much work on his plate.
“I expect to reduce my time at Twitter and find somebody else to run Twitter over time,” he testified at a trial about his Tesla pay package this past month. He also said he has been spending most of his time of late focusing on Twitter.
It isn’t clear who would take over leading Twitter if Mr. Musk were to step aside. Most of its prior top leaders either were fired or left after he took over.
“No one wants the job who can actually keep Twitter alive. There is no successor,” Mr. Musk tweeted Sunday.
Some Tesla shareholders have complained that Mr. Musk’s recent focus on Twitter is hurting the auto maker. This month he sold more than $3.5 billion of Tesla stock in his second round of sales since buying Twitter. It wasn’t clear what prompted Mr. Musk to sell additional Tesla stock, and the company didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Mr. Musk had previously tweeted, “At risk of stating obvious, beware of debt in turbulent macroeconomic conditions, especially when Fed keeps raising rates.” Twitter, as part of the acquisition by Mr. Musk, took on around $13 billion in debt.
Mr. Musk has turned to Twitter polls several times recently.
This past month, Mr. Musk reinstated Mr. Trump’s Twitter account after polling users about whether the platform should do so. Nearly 52% of users voted in favor of reinstating Mr. Trump’s account. Mr. Musk has also polled users about other decisions around account suspensions.
It is unclear how much the poll results influence Mr. Musk’s decisions. Last year he asked on Twitter whether he should sell Tesla stock at a time he had already committed to a share-sell program that wasn’t yet public.
Mr. Musk has been trying to boost user engagement in Twitter after lamenting even before closing the deal for the platform that it had lost its attraction to some big name users. He has also tried to make Twitter less dependent on digital advertising, which accounted for about 90% of its revenue. An effort to bolster Twitter’s paid-for subscription service suffered several false starts and was finally relaunched last week.
The policy change announced on Sunday took aim at the ability of users to link to rival platforms. Twitter said the ban on tweets and accounts engaging in “free promotion” affected platforms including Facebook and Instagram, both owned by Meta Platforms Inc., Mastodon, Truth Social—the platform set up by Mr. Trump—and others.
After the new rule was announced, Mr. Musk tweeted later Sunday that it would be modified: “Policy will be adjusted to suspending accounts only when that account’s *primary* purpose is promotion of competitors, which essentially falls under the no spam rule.”
First published in Wall Street Journal