Elon Musk’s time at the helm of Twitter could be coming to an end faster than many anticipated, with the CEO posting a poll asking “Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.”
At the time of publication, the poll had just over 6 and a half million votes with 9 hours remaining. 58% of those votes have suggested that, yes, Musk should step down.
Musk quickly followed up the poll with a Tweet saying that “As the saying goes, be careful what you wish, as you might get it.”
He has also since Tweeted about the Twitter Files, and that “Those who want power are the ones who least deserve it.”
This is not the first time that Musk has put major policy decisions to the people of Twitter. Last month, Musk asked whether the platform should reinstate the previously banned account of former US President Donald Trump – the result was a narrow win for the ‘Yes’ vote, with Musk responding to the results with a Tweet that simply read “Vox Populi, Vox Dei” (translating to ‘the voice of the people is the voice of God’).
This month, a series of journalists also had their accounts suspended after they reported on an account that used public flight data to track Musk’s private jet. Musk shut down the flight tracker account, and eventually restored the journalists’ accounts after yet another Twitter poll.
Musk bought the social media platform in October for US$44bn, after an attempt to pull out of the deal failed. After the deal went through, Musk simply tweeted that “The bird is freed.”
Since then, Twitter has endured mass executive layoffs, the loss of several major advertisers, and predictions that more than 30 million users are expected to leave Twitter over the next two years.
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