Elon Musk Continues Series Of Contentious Twitter Policies, Culminating In Poll Showing Users Want A New CEO

Elon Musk had a contentious day online after watching the World Cup Final in Qatar yesterday. Just after he posted his assassination coordinates, Twitter announced a controversial new policy that set off a chain of events that concluded with him posting a poll asking the site if he should stay on as the head of Twitter, which ultimately voted in favor of a new CEO.

Adding to the controversy right as France and Argentina elevated yesterday's game into arguably the best World Cup Final in history, Twitter announced that posting links to other social media channels was now a suspendable offense.

"We recognize that many of our users are active on other social media platforms. However, we will no longer allow free promotion of certain social media platforms on Twitter," wrote the Twitter support account. "Specifically, we will remove accounts created solely for the purpose of promoting other social platforms and content that contains links or usernames for the following platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribel, Nostr and Post."

This unleashed a series of extremely harsh criticisms aimed at Twitter and Musk, as it seemed to many that the sole purpose of the policy was to metaphorically lock the doors of a burning Twitter and prevent people from jumping to safety.

It also seemed as though the new policy was implemented well before it was announced, as some users who had been suspended seemingly without cause realized afterward they had told people to follow their other social media channels.

While the new policy inspired Twitter users to frantically set up accounts elsewhere, others openly pleaded with Musk to think about how the policy would harm users, as many use Twitter to promote their businesses, art or music. And, remarkably, that worked, as Elon seemed to have his mind changed by right-wing YouTuber TheQuartering, among others.

The policy was quickly deleted and Musk suggested only accounts whose sole purpose is to drive traffic away from Twitter would get suspended (at the time of writing, all major social media networks still have active Twitter accounts). He also apologized and said from now on all major policy decisions would be decided by polling Twitter's user base.

Speaking of polls, Musk's next tweet after apologizing for springing a wild policy change on the site without a poll was a poll on if he should remain as Twitter's CEO. "I will abide by the results," he said. After 12 hours, "remain" lost 57 percent to 43 percent.

Throughout the night and early morning as "leave" votes racked up, Musk then made some cryptic posts on his account, posting a series of quotes (of note, the below tweets were posted between 3 and 5 a.m. Qatar time).

However, many doubted that Musk simply left his fate up to 12 million Twitter users on a whim. To some users, it seemed more likely that Musk was already planning on stepping down and was orchestrating a grand gesture to make his exit seem magnanimous — though this is mere speculation.

According to others, one such reason for the timing of the poll could be to boost Tesla stock. It's rumored that many of Tesla's biggest shareholders are furious that Musk is focusing his attention on Twitter while Tesla hemorrhages money. With some on Tesla's board said to be threatening Musk's ouster as its CEO, the fact Musk has publically declared an intent to step back from Twitter was apparently enough to get Tesla stock a boost right as his poll wrapped up and the market opened Monday morning.

"Stepping down from #twitter" poll by #musk worked as expected by him .Tesla is up 5% pre market pic.twitter.com/A3LtKpJDQN

— Madhur Chadha 🔥🐀 mastodon.online/madhur (madhurchadha) December 19, 2022

Another possibility (albeit also unconfirmed) for Musk's sudden and apparent desire to step back from Twitter CEO involves a rumor Musk had talks with disappointed Saudi Twitter investors at the World Cup Final, who were purportedly displeased with him and asked him to stop running the company like an amateur. Also at that Final was Jared Kushner, who people have speculated is a potential investor or the prime candidate to replace Musk.

current conspiracy theory:Elon Musk posted this poll right after meeting with the Saudis (Twitter's 2nd largest investor) & Jared Kushner. Musk is tanking the Saudi's investment so badly that they're replacing him with Kushner. The poll is Musk's frantic attempt to save face. https://t.co/yneJGLWnjs pic.twitter.com/w2DAuDEWHk

— KiraChats 👽 (@KiraChats) December 19, 2022

Whatever the case, the Vox Populi, Vox Dei is soundly calling for Musk to get his hands out of Twitter's business. Now, the Twitter userbase waits to see if he listens.