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SpaceX and Tesla chief Mr. Elon Musk seems to have taken a break from Twitter after his latest poll saw a large majority of users advise the billionaire to step down as the company's head. Musk, who bought Twitter earlier this year for an eye watering $44 billion, aims to transform the site as a global exchange for free ideas - something he believes is essential for his company SpaceX's plans to make humanity an interplanetary species. However, his role at Twitter might come to an end soon, at least when as far as daily operations are concerned, should he follow through with the poll that ended earlier today.
Elon Musk Still To Confirm Whether He Will Step Down As Twitter Head After Followers Advise Him To Do So
Mr. Musk's brief role at Twitter has seen him become the center of controversy once again. In all fairness, Twitter has perhaps been the most controversial site in American politics to late, surpassing the outrage generated by its rival Facebook in the aftermath of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
Since he took over, the executive has reinstated a host of different Twitter accounts which previous the previous administration banned. The most notable of these is the account of former President Donald Trump, who had resorted to setting up his own social media platform to communicate with his followers after Twitter suspended him.
However, Musk, who has so far been resilient in the face of relentless and often brutal criticism, seemed to have a change of heart after the FIFA World Cup final in Qatar yesterday. Rumor has it that the executive met with high powered investors on the sidelines on the sidelines of the final yesterday, and the interactions were not pleasant. Of course, neither Musk nor the investors have confirmed this, so do take this bit of speculation with a grain of salt.
Musk's $44 billion Twitter takeover has been funded partly by debt taken out by the company itself and partly by the Saudi prince Talal Al-waleed's $1.4 billion and roughly $400 million from the Qatari sovereign wealth fund. Before the deal, Musk was already Twitter's largest shareholder after he managed to buy a 9.1% stake in the company.
After attending the World Cup final, Musk made two critical tweets - both of which are crucial in Twitter's daily affairs The first saw the executive announce that he would not make any significant policy changes at the company before holding a vote. The second saw him ask his followers and everyone else to vote if they would like him to step down as Twitter's de-facto head. Of course, whether his meeting with the investors in Qatar influenced the tweets is conjecture and is unsupported by any direct causal link.
The poll came to a head earlier today when millions of users voted for Musk to step down. The final statistics show that 17.5 million users voted, out of which 57.5%, or roughly 10 million, wanted Musk to step down. His very decision to create a poll for this act started a trend on Twitter which was titled "DO NOT STEP DOWN". As of the time of writing, 19,500 tweets are part of this trend, which is relatively low compared to the 'Yes' votes received by Musk.
Crucially, Musk is still to acknowledge the results of the controversial poll. His last tweet was 18 hours back, a relatively long period for the executives who often takes a break from tweeting only when he has to sleep. Musk has also raised concerns about the difficulty of finding the right person to run Twitter, and has questioned those asking him for the role if they would still want it had they invested their "life savings" in the company.
