Elon Musk largely silent, after Twitter poll showed users want him to leave

Twitter poll tells Elon Musk to resign

In the latest sign of tumult at Twitter, CEO Elon Musk launched a poll about whether he should remain in charge of the tech company. Responders said he should step down.

SAN FRANCISCO - Words of protest were projected onto the Twitter building in downtown San Francisco Monday night. The projectionist, a San Francisco activist named Alan Marling, says he did it after seeing CEO Elon Musk's Twitter poll.

"Elon Musk posted about whether or not he should resign," said Marling.

The poll, which attracted more than 17.5 million Twitter users, resulted in 57.5% of the votes in favor of Musk stepping down and 42.5% in favor of him staying on as CEO.

"I think he doesn't want to be CEO of Twitter when it goes bankrupt. He wants someone else to swallow that. But the fact is, what he's done to Twitter has been irresponsible," said Marling.

Musk said he would abide by the poll results, but Monday did not post any comments giving details. Instead, he responded to a tweet that suggested only users who have paid to have blue checkmarks be allowed to vote in polls involving policy because they represent the only users "with skin in the game."

Musk replied "Good point. I will make that change."

This follows a week of chaos where Musk banned some journalists and mentions of competing social media sites, followed by sudden reversals and reinstatements.

"For investors, for customers, for advertisers, chaos is not what they're looking for. They're looking for a reliable platform," said Jennifer Chatman, associate dean and professor at UC Berkeley Haas Business School, who called Musk's behavior and his poll bizarre.

"It seems like an antic or something he's doing for show rather than a strategic decision," said Chatman. "One has to wonder whether in fact what he's trying to do is simply to continue to be in the limelight and ensure that Twitter is a high-action place."

Chatman says from a business perspective, Musk's investment in Twitter so far appears to be a money-losing move.

"It has lost an enormous amount of value and most of that is Elon Musk's money or the money that he has borrowed to purchase Twitter," said Chatman.

Chatman says with Twitter in chaos, it is a prime business opportunity for new platforms to try and attract Twitter users. Twitter, however, has grown to have a worldwide reach, and Chatman says replacing Twitter might not be as simple as creating the next new app.

"In the U.S., we take for granted the availability of these type of platforms, but in other parts of the world these platforms are lifelines and it's not so easy for people to just ditch their account and do something else," said Chatman.

Words of protest were projected onto the Twitter building in downtown San Francisco Monday night. The projectionist, a San Francisco activist named Alan Marling, says he did it after seeing CEO Elon Musk's Twitter poll.