Elon Musk has a reputation for being an unpredictable but brilliant business leader. In his first 10 days as Twitter boss, we saw more of the former than the latter.
Twitter has long been viewed by Silicon Valley investors as poorly run — but with a lot of potential.
Mr Musk lured his wealthy friends into investing, arguing that Twitter – in the hands of someone who knows what they’re doing – could be great. Free speech would abound and profits would follow.
But the first 10 days at the helm have exposed Mr Musk’s lack of experience running a social media company.
It was all smiles as he took over, tweeting, “The bird is freed.”
However, Mr Musk’s initial guidelines appeared to be at odds with his comments over the summer.
While he had said he was a “free speech absolutist” and that Donald Trump would be allowed onto the platform, he now argued that a “council” full of “diverse” voices would be set up to decide controversial moderation decisions and permanent suspensions.
Mr Musk announced a policy very similar to that of Facebook – which has an “oversight board” for these issues.
He also said the moderation policy will not be changed in the short term.
But he announced a big change – to Twitter’s verification system.
The platform is charging users who want a blue tick verified account $8 (£7) a month after initial reports of a $20 monthly fee were met with complaints from some celebrities, including author Stephen King.
While this price cut was already decided, it gave the impression that pricing was not well thought out and famous users were dictating politics.
There were other criticisms as well.
The directive should be implemented in a few days. Anyone could pay to be verified and not only would they get a blue tick, they would also have priority on replies, mentions, and searches. In other words, accounts could now pay for prestige – and be boosted on the platform.
The announcement of the policy immediately raised questions about authenticity and fairness. The content would now float above others because the user had paid for their monthly subscription.
Mr Musk said his policy is a way to address Twitter’s bot problem. Bulk verification would weed out spam accounts. But it was also about money – he believes a subscription model for Twitter is a way to make a profit.
Others raised questions about what opening up the verification process to the spread of disinformation would mean.
If verification is open to anyone, how could Twitter confirm that everyone is who they say they are?
With the US midterm elections approaching, some feared people might pose as poll coordinators or journalists and spread disinformation about voters.
It seemed obvious that a lot of human resources would be required to adequately verify the expected flood of new accounts. any of the 300 million daily active Twitter users can apply.
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In his first week, Mr Musk had reportedly asked managers to draw up lists of employees to be released.
On Thursday – less than seven days after Mr Musk officially bought the company – employees received an email telling them their jobs were at risk. About half of the 7,500 Twitter employees were fired as a result.
This huge downsizing has raised more than a few eyebrows. Why pay $44 billion for a company and then lay off half the workforce?
The timing also seemed strange – how could an assessment of who should be fired be made so quickly?
Staff were told they would receive an official confirmation email by 16:00 GMT on Friday, but many never received it.
Simon Balmain, a senior community manager who was logged off his Twitter account, told the BBC he was in “limbo”.
Twitter’s offices were reportedly closed to all employees, including those in mission-critical jobs. Employees were banned from their accounts en masse. Few knew what was going on.
Questions about moderation were immediately raised. How has Twitter been able to suppress disinformation and hate speech on its platform when so many employees have been laid off?
On Friday night, Twitter’s head of integrity, Yoel Roth, tweeted that although half of the company had been laid off, those employed in frontline moderation had experienced “the least impact”.
Still, in such a state of flux, how could Twitter initiate an unprecedented policy change to its verified account structure?
It was announced on Saturday that the new verification process is set to take place – anyone can apply to get a blue tick.
But then New York Times reports suggested the process had been delayed — until after the midterms.
It seemed as if Twitter realized that introducing such a momentous policy change – so close to important elections – could wreak havoc.
And then, on Sunday, Bloomberg reported that Twitter was now urging some laid-off workers to come back — that letting some of them go was a mistake.
Twitter has not responded to BBC requests for comment on these stories.
It’s been hard to follow at times – and we’re only 10 days into it. But the chaos suggests that if Mr Musk had a near-term strategy to change Twitter, it won’t exactly go according to plan.
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