Elon Musk Asks Users If He Should Step Down As Twitter Head, Twitterati Votes Yes

Twitter CEO Musk has been riddled with controversies over policy changes and major decisions such as mass layoffs, suspending, and revoking suspensions on accounts.

Twitter is trying to block competitors amid Musk's crackdown on a host of accounts.

Source : AFP

Twitter CEO Elon Musk on Monday asked users via an online poll to decide whether or not he should stay in charge of the social media platform as he acknowledged making a mistake in launching severe speech restrictions with a bid to ban mentions of rival social media websites. At the time of writing, the poll appears to be wrapped up, with over 17.5 million users putting in their votes, with a majority of 57.5 percent leaning towards "Yes". Musk did say that he'd abide by the results of the poll, so it remains to be seen what Musk does next. 

In a drastic policy change, Twitter announced that users will be “prohibited” to share post links to Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, and other platforms. 

The move generated a lot of immediate backlash leading to Twitter’s new billionaire owner Musk promising not to make any more major policy changes without an online survey of users.

Going forward, there will be a vote for major policy changes. My apologies. Won’t happen again.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022

“My apologies. Won’t happen again,” Musk tweeted, before initiating a new 12-hour poll asking if he should step down as head of Twitter. “I will abide by the results of this poll.”

Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022

Twitter is trying to block competitors amid Musk's crackdown on a host of accounts. Last week, he shut down a Twitter account that was tracking the flights of his private jet, he also suspended the Twitter handles of journalists who he accused of "doxxing" him. He reversed the suspensions on journos after conducting a Twitter poll. 

Twitter blacklists accounts of other social media platforms

Twitter accounts of Facebook, Instagram, and upstart rivals Mastodon, Tribel, Nostr, Post, and former US president Donald Trump’s Truth Social have been blacklisted. Twitter did not explain why the blacklist included those seven websites but not others such as Parler, TikTok, or LinkedIn

Twitter on Sunday said that it will remove accounts created solely for promoting other social platforms and content that contains links or usernames.

The move would impact content from social media platforms like Meta Platforms' Facebook and Instagram, along with Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribel, Nostr, and Post while allowing cross-content posting, Twitter support informed in a tweet which has now been deleted.

"We still allow cross-posting content from any social media platform. Posting links or usernames to social media platforms not listed above are also not in violation of this policy," the Twitter thread mentioned.

Short video-platform TikTok, owned by China's ByteDance Ltd, was not included in the list.

Musk has previously stated that he did not want to be Twitter CEO, hinting that he would find someone else for the job. He is currently CEO of Tesla Inc, SpaceX, The Boring Company, Neuralink, and the Musk Foundation