Twitter Founder Takes a Harsh Shot at Elon Musk

Biz Stone was in on the ground floor of Twitter when the company debuted in 2006.

Twitter has evolved over the years, changing from just a microblogging platform to an invaluable source of news and entertainment for tens of millions of users. 

But as Twitter continues to evolve, now under the leadership of Tesla  (TSLA) - Get Free Report CEO Elon Musk, at least one person who was in on the ground floor of the company's development is concerned about where Twitter is headed. 

Musk "doesn't seem like" the right person to lead Twitter, Biz Stone, who co-founded Twitter with Jack Dorsey and others in 2006, told The Guardian in a recent interview. 

Being the head of Twitter is "not really a win-win situation... it's always tough. 50% of the people are gonna be happy, 50% are gonna be upset with you," Stone said. 

"You have to be OK with stuff that you just like or don't agree with being on there. Otherwise, you should just go buy a magazine or a newspaper or something where it's OK to have a specific leaning."

Musk's Specific Leanings

Stone left Twitter about six years after its founding, but was asked by Dorsey to return to the company in 2017. 

"My top focus will be to guide the company culture, that energy, that feeling," he said upon his return on his Medium blog. So it's not surprising that he doesn't approve of the direction the company's new owner is taking Twitter. 

Stone says the "improvements" the company made in morale and overseeing content are "all gone now" under the leadership of Musk. 

While he says he is "neither conventionally right nor left" Musk's own political leanings have evolved in recent years, and he has become more politically active on Twitter since he took over the company. 

And that political activity has skewed to the right, which is probably rubbing some of the company's more liberal patriarchs the wrong way.