Il December 18 Musk he asked with a poll are Twitter if he were to leave the social network and the 57.5% of respondents asked for his resignation. If he were to really listen to the “Vox populi”, the kingdom of Elon Musk come CEO of Twitter would last a little longer than fifty days: Which results got in this period the billionaire?
Twitter wants the resignation of Elon Musk, his results as CEO of the social network
From before the acquisition for 44 billion dollars of the social network, Musk had explained that he didn’t want to remain CEO of Twitter forever. But times seem to be running out, above all because the investors of his other companies and above all of Tesla, the real source of his assets, would like him to go back to dealing with electric cars full-time. After Musk sold 3.4 billion euros worth of Tesla shares, their value it’s almost 50% of last year’s. So much so that he is no longer the richest man in the world.
But on the flip side, just last Thursday Musk wrote in response to a tweet that “Nobody who wants the job could really keep Twitter alive. There is no successor”. Also because it seems difficult to find a personality who can manage the company with Musk still the owner and very active on the platform. If Musk leaves control of Twitter as CEO, Would his polls still have decision-making value? Or the new admin could ignore them (without getting fired). After the sensational outcome of the poll that asked for his resignation, Musk limited himself to retweet institutional posts by Tesla and SpaceX. How much Will this calm last?
Also, the situation that Elon Musk would leave to the new CEO of Twitter it is by no means idyllic: the results obtained in these fifty days make the company less solid than when it bought it.
A skeleton staff
When Musk walked into the Twitter offices with a sink (to let the news “sink in”) on Oct. 28, one of the first steps was to cleanse the incumbent leadership. Within hours, he fired the CEO Parag Agrawalhe CFO Ned Segal and the head of policy for security and privacy Vijaya Gadde. In the first two weeks those responsible for privacy, moderation, advertising, marketing left. Replaced by one fifty Tesla engineerscalled to make a emergency double job.
On Nov. 4, Twitter also began laying off employees at various levels of the company, with an email announcing the layoff after asking department heads to summarize each worker’s job in two lines. The goal was to fire 50% of the 7,500 employees, but after Musk’s ultimatum to those who remained, many other workers left the company. Now Twitter has just over 2,000 employees, about 25% of the number it had fifty days ago.
To these layoffs are added the independent workers under contract with Twitter: second Platformer a number from 4,400 to 5,500 would have lost their jobs with the social network. Even the cleaning staff have lost their jobs, replaced by robots.
Several ex-Twitter workers have denounced the layoffs, with an engineer telling her story to the Economist and a group of female employees denouncing why the cuts have hit the 57% of women in the company, against 47% of men. It seems that the employees who contested the dismissal are at least 1,200.
In addition to personnel cuts, also to physical spaces and infrastructures (including servers): it seems that Musk wants to save money a billion dollars in this areaaccording to Reuters.
Elon Musk’s achievements as CEO of Twitter: making the blue checks pay
If the layoffs represented the first and most cumbersome legacy among Elon Musk’s achievements as CEO of Twitter, the Paid “blue checks” are the second. On Twitter, a blue checkmark ensures that the account is verified: a certification for large companies, well-known personalities, journalists. Musk has decided to make this token purchasable as part of the Twitter Blue subscription, even for justify doubling the price.
Musk wanted to launch it quickly, as soon as it arrived. But he immediately had to postpone after the Midterm elections in America (in which he advised to vote Republican). On launch day, Twitter was in shambles. Many users have bought the blue ticks, to then change their name and pretend to be personalities and companies. Super Mario middle finger on Twitter dto a fake Nintendo Account, a fake LeBron James pretended to switch teams. And several companies suffered damage. The striking case is that of the company Eli Lilly: a fake account promised that it would provide insulin for free, by doing stock market crash.
In the following days, an inscription appeared “Official” next to the name of accounts that were previously verified, but Musk l‘he “killed” with a tweet. On November 11, Twitter suspended the news, promising it would returned November 29. But then he postponed the launch to find a way to avoid impersonations. And also to get around the 30% rate on the iPhone, where the subscription will cost four dollars more.
On December 12, Twitter finally launched the new Twitter Blue in a (perhaps) definitive way with several important innovations. Like a gold check for companies and a gray one for institutions, as well as the possibility of subscribing only for those who have been registered for at least 90 days and have been active in the last 30 (to avoid bots and trolls as much as possible). The 4,000-character Community Notes are also arriving, for those who want to create longer and more exhaustive posts. However, the service is not available for Italy, at least for now. Twitter also promised more in the near future, such as the ability to post longer videos and see half of the ads.
The moderation and farewell of the most important advertisers
The Twitter Blue debacle has led several large advertisers to take down their ads on Twitter (which accounts for more than 90% of the social’s revenue). Three of America’s leading advertising agencies have argued that the risk for company images is too high, especially after the Eli Lilly episode. Twitter offered important economic advantages to convince the advertisers back to the platform.
But several experts have argued, publicly and with customers, that Twitter at this time does not seem able to enforce the moderation rules (which remain unchanged after the arrival of Musk). In particular, Musk’s emphasis on the importance of free speech seems to have prompted several trolls to behaving boorishly on Twitter. Il Network Contagion Research Institue pointed out that in the twelve hours after Musk’s takeover, the use ofracist epithet for black (what Americans call “n-word”) is increased by 500%.
The fact that, after having assured the NAACP (American anti-racist body) that he would not reinstate the accounts banned for hate speech, Musk reneged on his word is considered another important image problem. Musk has reintroduced the accounts of several banned users and ex-President Trump after polls on his personal account.
The cancellation of the Twitter Security Committee, a body that wanted to give impartial advice on moderation practices, is seen as a further demonstration of the fact that, although the policy have not changed, their enforcement has.
The other ideas of Musk and the results obtained by the CEO of Twitter
In these 50 particularly confusing days, Musk has always kept one goal in mind: that of Twitter 2.0. A series of innovations that should bring the social app to become a “superapp”, capable of providing different functionalities to the users. The new checkmark of Twitter Blue is theoretically among the novelties of this Twitter 2.0. And so far it’s the only one Musk has attempted.
Among other things there are videos as a new form of income, “resuscitating” Vine, the social app that Twitter had bought and then shut down. Musk said he can deliver better percentages than YouTube to creatives, even if for now there are no details about it.
Among other novelties in the presentation of Musk, the “advertising as entertainment” (with quizzes and tests without leaving the Twitter app), encrypted messages (on this it seems that there is already a dedicated team), long blog-style tweets (like those that arrived in the new Twitter Blue). But above all the possibility of using Twitter for payments, transforming the social network into a digital bank: according to the New York Times, he would have deposited the documentation with the Treasury Ministry. It would appear that Musk is about to launch a crypto called Twitter Coin, although it is not yet confirmed.
The possibilities are therefore not lacking, even if they are scripts that Twitter (video) or Musk (PayPal payments) have already recited. However, hard to count them as achievements of Elon Musk as CEO of Twitter when the most egregious projects are still only projects without a release date. And without knowing if they will be successful.
Musk’s legacy on social media
Despite the length of this article (for which we apologize), we have only scratched the surface of all the news concerning Musk in these fifty days. Undoubtedly, among Musk’s accomplishments as CEO of Twitter is having brought social media back to the center of the discussion. Even if Twitter should be the “square” on which to discuss, not …