Musk has asked Twitter followers to vote on whether he should stand down

Elon Musk, who has been under fire for recent policy changes at Twitter, has asked users to vote on whether he should stand down as the social media site’s CEO.

In a tweet Sunday, the billionaire owner of Twitter and CEO of Tesla Inc. committed to follow the results of the poll. With 9 hours remaining and 7.4 million votes cast, 57% of those surveyed have chosen yes. In the United States, three of the top trending topics were about the site itself, including “VOTE YES” and “CEO of Twitter.”

Following his purchase of Twitter, Musk has faced criticism for major changes at the social network, such as sacking more than half of its personnel and restoring previously prohibited users, as well as requests to refocus on Tesla, whose stock price has been falling. He has devoted most of his time to the social service after grudgingly finalising the Twitter acquisition at the end of October.

He was tweeting late into the night Thursday following an altercation with journalists, who are among Twitter’s most engaged and active users. The corporation barred some of them from appearing in big outlets such as the Washington Post and CNN, claiming they were doxxing his whereabouts.

Twitter also announced a policy change over the weekend, prohibiting accounts “created solely” to promote competing social networks. This move resulted in the suspension of at least one notable account, prompting Musk to announce he’ll change the policy barely hours after it was implemented. His on-the-fly rewriting of Twitter’s rules has also created resentment among users and advertisers, leading to uncertainty about what content can and cannot be posted.

Musk apologised on Sunday and stated that he will hold votes on important policy changes. Three minutes later, he posted a poll asking if he should resign. The Twitter Safety account later sponsored a vote on whether the policy of eliminating accounts promoting other social networking sites should be implemented.