Less than 48 hours after he apologised to Twitter staff for growing the social media giant "too quickly" following Elon Musk firing roughly half of the company's 7,500 employees, Jack Dorsey, its co-founder and former CEO, took on the billionaire asking him about what Musk said was the company’s vision. Dorsey also expressed his dislike for the new name of Twitter’s “Birdwatch” feature.
This was followed by a verbal encounter between the two on the platform, with Musk saying, “Not everything needs to have ‘bird’ in the name.
“Twitter needs to become by far the most accurate source of information about the world. That’s our mission,” Musk tweeted.
“Accurate to who? (sic),” Dorsey asked him.
“As judged by the people of Twitter via Community Notes (formerly Birdwatch),” the Tesla and SpaceX boss replied.
“I still think…Birdwatch is a far better name. And ‘more informative’ a far better goal,” Jack Dorsey said.
Twitter’s Birdwatch program adds comments to relevant posts if enough people with a wide range of opinions find them "helpful." Musk renamed the feature to call it “Community Notes’.
“Birdwatch gives me the creeps,” Elon Musk told Dorsey.
Dorsey shot back: “Community notes is the most boring Facebook name ever.”
Musk’s comeback to this was to raise the alleged internal fighting at Twitter. “Not everything needs to have ‘bird’ in the name! Too many bird groups fighting each internally other at Twitter. Angry Birds,” he responded.
Dorsey had endorsed the takeover by Musk, calling it "the right path" in a Twitter post in April.
"Folks at Twitter past and present are strong and resilient," Dorsey wrote Saturday. "They will always find a way no matter how difficult the moment."
Dorsey left the Twitter board of directors earlier this year, but remains an indirect shareholder in the company.
Musk, the world’s richest man, last week declared an $8 per month fee for the blue tick to verify users' accounts, arguing the plan to charge users for the blue tick would solve the platform's issues with bots and trolls while creating a new revenue stream for the company.
(With inputs from AFP)
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