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Published 07:53 IST, December 19th 2022

"Should I step down as head of Twitter?" Elon Musk asks users' opinion in recent poll

Tesla CEO Elon Musk on Monday conducted a new poll asking millions of users of the micro-blogging site "Should I step down as head of Twitter"?

Reported by: Astha Singh
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Tesla Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Elon Musk on Monday conducted a new poll asking millions of users of the micro-blogging site, "Should I step down as head of Twitter?" Notably, since the time Musk has taken over Twitter he has made a flurry of policy changes including laying off half of its employees and reinstating previously barred users.

In a series of tweets, he asked multiple questions through polls. The first one was whether he should step down as head of Twitter with - Yes and No options assuring the users that he will abide by the poll results. He added, "Going forward, there will be a vote for major policy changes. My apologies. Won't happen again."

As the polls garnered 6,515,177 votes within the span of 9 hours, Tesla CEO in yet another tweet advised users to be cautious of their choices as they might come true. "As the saying goes, be careful what you wish, as you might get it," he tweeted.

This poll comes after Elon Musk was recently criticised for suspending the accounts of journalists who cover the social media platform and its new owner (Musk), including reporters working for The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, and other publications. Neither the company nor Musk gave any explanation for why it took down the accounts and made their profiles and past tweets disappear.

Twitter suspends journalists who wrote about Musk 

The sudden suspension of news reporters followed Musk’s decision Wednesday to permanently ban an account that automatically tracked the flights of his private jet using publicly available data. Twitter also changed its rules to prohibit the sharing of another person’s current location without their consent. Following this, he also announced that anyone who doxxes a person on Twitter will be suspended from Twitter for 7 days.

On December 16, during the Twitter Spaces conference, which was held by Buzzfeed's Kate Notopoulos, Musk left the call after he was asked to address his decision of suspending the Twitter accounts of popular journalists.

In a recording of the conversation shared widely on social media, several journalists questioned the billionaire's recent abrupt move. The Washington Post's Drew Harwell, whose account was among those that were suspended this week pointed out how Musk had done something similar by sharing a New York Post article from 2020 on US President Joe Biden’s son Hunter.

Responding to it, Musk said: "There is not special treatment for journalists." "You dox, you get suspended, end of story," he added. Notopoulos, the host of the conference, then goes on to ask the CEO another question, before realising that he had already left the chat. "Oh. I think Elon has left," she said, as other journalists added: "That's unfortunate." 

07:54 IST, December 19th 2022