Effectively, we had run, people. No, wait, sorry – it was a catastrophically dangerous run, a rollercoaster with out brakes that brought about every kind of varied chaos and distress for individuals who simply wished to, you recognize, use Twitter like a traditional social media platform.
Twitter proprietor and chief government Elon Musk has introduced in a tweet (due to course he did it in a tweet) that he plans to step down as CEO of the social media large, revealing that his alternative – an unnamed girl – can be taking up in round six weeks’ time.
Excited to announce that I’ve employed a brand new CEO for X/Twitter. She can be beginning in ~6 weeks!My position will transition to being exec chair & CTO, overseeing product, software program & sysops.Might 11, 2023
Musk added that he plans to stay round in an operational capability, being “exec chair & CTO, overseeing product, software program & sysops”. That appears like various stuff, however then once more, Musk didn’t precisely do a lot as Twitter’s CEO both – apart from costing himself $24 billion {dollars}, I suppose.
There have been rumblings that Musk was searching for a alternative for some time now, and Tesla shareholders have reportedly been placing stress on him to focus extra on the electrical automotive agency than Twitter, so this isn’t solely unsurprising. Based on CNBC, Tesla shares jumped 2% instantly after the announcement.
Ought to I keep or ought to I’m going?
I’m not satisfied, although. Keep in mind when Musk posted a Twitter ballot saying he’d step down as CEO if the consumer base voted for him to go? We voted him out, and he wormed his manner out of that one by blaming bots and saying that he’d restrict Twitter polls to customers subscribed to Twitter Blue (which he hasn’t achieved).
The easy truth is that the self-styled Tony Stark hasn’t actually abided by quite a lot of the issues he’s mentioned he would since buying Twitter for $44 billion again in October 2022. We’ve seen quite a lot of issues promised which haven’t materialized – although I hope a few of his plans by no means see the sunshine of day, like his invasive plans for telephone name performance that threaten to make Twitter unusable for ladies.
It’s telling that he refers back to the social media platform as ‘X/Twitter’ in his announcement. Musk has made no secret of his want to make Twitter (or ‘X’ as he needs it to be recognized) the ‘every thing app’, folding a wide range of options into it as a part of a daring reimagining that, uh, mainly simply copies WhatsApp.
X gon’ give it to ya
If Musk really is handing over the reins to a brand new CEO then his tweet suggests he’s going to be focusing much less on operating the enterprise facet of issues and extra on the software program facet; which means he may lastly push by way of the transition to ‘X’ that he so desperately needs.
Is that basically factor, although? Musk merely hasn’t been in a position to make the social media app worthwhile, regardless of makes an attempt to drive customers to pay for Twitter Blue and squeeze companies to entry the Twitter API.
In actual fact, Elon has been driving the location additional and additional into the bottom – due, partly, to a basic misunderstanding of what made Twitter interesting within the first place. His addition of 10,000-character-long tweets (just for customers who cough up the money for Blue, thoughts) demonstrates a complete lack of understanding of Twitter’s core enchantment: social media decreased to bitesize, simply digestible chunks.
In a world the place nearly each social media platform is regularly morphing into the identical homogeneous blur of ten-second video reels manufactured to maximise engagement, Twitter stands out as one thing completely different, one thing distinctive. Musk has been threatening to damage that, and his shifting over to a extra operational position relatively than the corporate’s figurehead may truly be a nasty factor for the way forward for Twitter.
As for who’ll be sitting within the CEO chair, there are suspicions floating round (as reported by The Verge) that Musk’s alternative can be NBC promoting exec Linda Yaccarino, who reportedly needs the job and will get alongside properly with the Tesla CEO. I don’t need to get overly political right here, however Yaccarino is seemingly a licensed Trump supporter… I’m certain that can go down properly on Twitter.
