It’s happening. Musk is dropping down as CEO and transitioning to executive chair and CTO of Twitter.
The tea? Musk has announced that he has found a replacement – referring to her as ‘she’ – but isn’t giving us an indication as to who ‘she’ will be.
The name highest on the speculation list is Linda Yaccarino, NBC Universal chairman of global advertising and partnerships with Dylan Byers, of Puck News, tweeting that two sources had confirmed the news.
From a selfish perspective, I would love to see a Latina boss on Twitter especially in a time where the platform is championing the future of web3. Longtime tech journalist Kara Swisher was first to publicly suggested Yaccarino would fit the bill, describing her in a tweet as being an “ad powerhouse and well liked.” The sentiment was echoed by a tech CEO who told Fortune “she is amazing.”
Having said that, whether it is Yaccarino or not, she’ll be entering a chaotic and seemingly endless to do list. Twitter has cut its staff to the bone, from roughly 8,000 employees to less than 1,000 since Musk took over last year, and the platform has seen multiple widespread technical glitches. Ad revenue has plummeted as many brands recoiled from the controversial content that Musk now allows on the platform.
Others have speculated that they internally hire Ella Irwan, Twitter’s VP of trust and safety. A fierce supporter of Musk, Irwin frequently serves as his mouthpiece and his heavy. She has reportedly assisted with changes to user account policy such as removing misinformation policies and temporarily suspending journalists who cover Musk and Twitter.
ANother speculation is Shivon Zilis who stepped down from the board of OpenAI in March, the timing of which came shortly after Musk criticised the company for having a liberal bias, the Information reported. She worked as a project director at Tesla on the Autopilot and chip-design teams and eventually made her way to Neuralink, where she was director of operations and special projects. Zilis also has twin children with Musk.
