Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey backtracked Saturday on his earlier endorsement of Elon Musk as the correct alternative to guide the corporate, talking out in opposition to the billionaire who, for the previous six months, has led Twitter by means of a collection of largely self-inflicted crises.
Requested on Bluesky, Dorsey’s new Twitter-like social media enterprise, whether or not he believed Musk has been the absolute best steward of Twitter, Dorsey mentioned flatly: “No.”
Dorsey added that Musk “ought to have walked away” from buying Twitter for US$44 billion, and faulted Twitter’s board in hindsight for making an attempt to compel Musk to observe by means of with the deal regardless of Musk’s makes an attempt to again out of the acquisition final 12 months.
“All of it went south,” Dorsey mentioned. “However it occurred and all we will do now could be construct one thing to keep away from that ever occurring once more.”
Twitter, which has lower a lot of its public relations crew underneath Musk, did not instantly reply to a request for remark.
Below Musk, Twitter has slashed most of its employees, suffered frequent service disruptions and made quite a lot of controversial modifications to its insurance policies and options, together with a latest determination to take away blue checks from VIP customers who do not pay to be verified.
Dorsey’s reflections, outlined in Bluesky posts reviewed by CNN, spotlight the Twitter founder’s rising disillusionment with Musk. Additionally they come after quite a few exchanges in latest months the place Dorsey has publicly questioned a few of Musk’s decision-making.
A 12 months in the past, Dorsey was fast to heap reward on Musk. When Musk’s deal to buy Twitter was first introduced, Dorsey mentioned that as long as Twitter needed to be owned by a single individual or firm, “Elon is the singular resolution I belief.”
“I belief his mission to increase the sunshine of consciousness,” Dorsey proclaimed on the time.
Dorsey additionally rolled over his greater than 18 million shares in Twitter (a roughly 2.4 per cent stake) into the brand new Musk-owned firm as an fairness investor, fairly than receiving a money payout, in accordance with a securities submitting after the deal was accomplished.
Now, although, Dorsey seems to imagine Musk was an imperfect alternative. Confronted by criticism from different Bluesky customers that Twitter might have gone in a distinct route, Dorsey argued that there was nothing stopping another person from outbidding Musk.
“If Elon or anybody needed to purchase the corporate, all they needed to do was title a value that the board felt was higher than what the corporate might do independently,” he mentioned. “That is true for each public firm.”
Requested whether or not he felt any duty for the function he performed within the transaction, Dorsey, who served on Twitter’s board on the time, mentioned he was not the one one that licensed the deal and that Twitter’s “solely various” to Musk was an acquisition by “hedge funds and Wall Avenue activists.”
“The corporate would have by no means survived as a public firm,” Dorsey claimed, including: “I want it have been completely different,” however that a few of Twitter’s income initiatives previous to Musk’s takeover “wouldn’t have mattered given market flip.”