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Tag: Jack Dorsey

  • Former CEO Jack Dorsey steps down from Twitter’s board of directors

    Former CEO Jack Dorsey steps down from Twitter’s board of directors

    Mumbai: Twitter’s former CEO Jack Dorsey has stepped down as a board member of the microblogging platform. Dorsey’s exit from the Twitter board means he no longer has anything to do with the social media giant and has exited completely.

    In November 2021, he also resigned from the position of CEO of Twitter. Then, he was replaced by Parag Agarwal, a technical expert of Indian origin. Parag was the CTO of the company at that time.

    His resignation comes at a time when there is a tussle between Elon Musk and Twitter. Musk is pressuring the company to reveal the actual number of fake or spam accounts on the platform.

  • Jack Dorsey steps down, Parag Agarwal named as Twitter CEO

    Jack Dorsey steps down, Parag Agarwal named as Twitter CEO

    Mumbai: Microblogging site Twitter has named Parag Agarwal as the new chief executive officer of the company effective immediately. The decision was announced by the outgoing CEO Jack Dorsey who stepped down from his position on Monday.

    Agarwal, an alumnus of IIT-Bombay and a PhD in Computer Science from Stanford University had joined the US company in 2011 as an Ads engineer. He was elevated as the chief technology officer in March 2018. As the CTO, he led technical strategy for the company and oversaw machine learning and AI across its product and infrastructure teams.

    Dorsey would continue to serve on the company’s board until the expiry of his term, which is May, next year. In an email to his employees, which he also shared on Twitter, Dorsey shared that he had worked hard to ensure that the company can break away from its founding and founders. “There’s a lot of talk about the company being founder-led. Ultimately I believe that it’s severely limiting, and a single point of failure,” he wrote, adding that it was the right time for him to leave, and there were three reasons which made him believe so.

    One of the reasons he enlisted was Agarwal, who has been behind every critical decision that helped turn the company around, and deeply understands the company and its needs. “My trust in him as our CEO is bone deep,” he wrote.

     

     

    Dorsey along with Biz Stone, Evan Williams and Noah Glass had founded the company in 2006. Dorsey left the company in 2008 to set up his digital payments app, Square, and made a comeback in 2015 and has remained the CEO since.

    “The world is watching us right now, even more than they have before. Lots of people are going to have lots of different views and opinions about today’s news. It is because they care about Twitter and it’s our future, and it’s a signal that the work we do here matters. Lets’ show the world Twitter’s potential,” wrote Agarwal.

     

     

  • Twitter promotes Sarah Personette to chief customer officer

    Mumbai: Twitter Inc has announced the promotion of Sarah Personette to chief customer officer, effective 1 August. The current VP of global client solutions, Personette, succeeds customers lead Matt Derella who moved on from the company after nine years.

    Personette leads Twitter’s relationships with top marketers and ad agencies. In her new role, she will be at the helm of the company’s global ad sales, global content partnerships, and revenue operations, according to a Reuters report.

    Personette joined Twitter in October 2018. Before that, she spent over three years as VP of the global business marketing team at Facebook.

    Personette’s appointment comes as Twitter aims to double its annual revenue by 2023 and expand its advertising avenues to better compete with digital ad giants including Facebook Inc.

    She will report directly to CEO Jack Dorsey and oversee Twitter’s ’emerging businesses’, including MoPub, an advertising technology product that helps app developers and mobile publishers earn ad revenue, the company said.

  • Twitter boss Jack Dorsey’s first tweet auctioned for $2.9 mn

    Twitter boss Jack Dorsey’s first tweet auctioned for $2.9 mn

    NEW DELHI: Priceless paintings, coveted jewels, hallowed memorabilia have come under the hammer often enough to become passe. It would seem that it’s the intangible things that hold value – a tweet, for example. But it’s no ordinary tweet.

    Twitter founder & CEO Jack Dorsey’s first ever tweet has been sold for upwards of $2.9 million. The virtual missive, which said "just setting up my twttr," was first published on 21 March 2006 and was auctioned off by Dorsey for charity.

    Sold to technology firm Bridge Oracle chief executive Sina Estavi, it was delivered to him as a non-fungible token, or NFT — a digital certificate of authenticity that confirms an item is real and one of a kind by recording the details on a blockchain digital ledger. Malaysia-based Estavi compared the purchase of the digital version of the tweet to buying a Mona Lisa painting.

     

     

    The Twitter boss tweeted the Bitcoin receipt of the proceeds from the auction on Monday, and said the funds were sent to the charity, Give Directly's Africa Response fund.

    According to Valuables, 95 per cent of the proceeds from the sale price go to the tweet's original creator while five per cent go to the platform.

    NFTs have recently swept the online collecting world. A digital artwork by artist Beeple sold for $69.4 million in an online auction by a British auction house earlier this month, with an NFT as a guarantee of its authenticity.

  • Twitter permanently bans Donald Trump

    Twitter permanently bans Donald Trump

    NEW DELHI: After years of hectoring allies, attacking opponents and disseminating disinformation, US President Donald Trump’s favourite online mouthpiece has been shut down. Twitter on Friday permanently suspended Trump’s account citing “risk of further incitement of violence,” thereby effectively cutting him off from his 88 million plus followers on the microblogging platform.

    Twitter’s move comes days after hundreds of pro-Trump protesters stormed Capitol Hill in Washington DC and unleashed chaos in the very seat of American power. The service clearly stated the incident was the trigger leading to the permanent ban on Trump, especially since the president had taken to Twitter to further propagate false claims about the 2020 US elections.

    Initially, in the wake of the Capitol riot, Twitter had locked Trump’s account for 12 hours following three tweets that violated the company’s terms of service. It restored his handle after 12 hours had elapsed, even as Facebook indefinitely suspended Trump’s page as “the risks” of allowing him to post on the platform are “too great.”

    No sooner was his Twitter account restored that Trump took to it and posted a video message telling his supporters to go home. He not only did not censure them for their actions, but instead, referred to them as “special people” and told them “we love you.” While he eventually posted another video statement saying he would support a peaceful transition of power, he followed it up with a tweet stating his intention to skip president-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration on 20 January.

    And while many commentators agree that it was a long time coming, Jack Dorsey gave Trump the boot from his platform as “in the context of horrific events this week, we made it clear on Wednesday that additional violations of the Twitter Rules would potentially result in this very course of action.”

    Trump, of course, did not take the snub lying down, and accused Twitter of having “coordinated with the Democrats and Radical Left” to suspend his @realDonaldTrump account. He also, according to several media reports, tried multiple times to post from alternate handles, like the official @POTUS account, but these tweets were promptly deleted by the platform.

    Apart from Twitter and Facebook, other social media networks have also shown some spine and are finally cracking down on Trump. Instagram, Snapchat and Twitch barred access to the president’s account, while YouTube enacted a stricter misinformation policy which makes it easier to suspend Trump for posting false election claims.

    Calls for Trump’s impeachment have been gaining momentum over the last couple of days, as bipartisan lawmakers and the common people alike hold the president responsible for spewing unfounded lies of voter fraud and provoking the mob that broke into and defaced the US Capitol. Five people, including a policeman, died in the riot.

    Democrat and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said the House would move ahead with the process to impeach Trump if he did not resign immediately. A CNN report stated that "multiple Republicans" and former Trump allies are considering supporting his impeachment. And while Trump was the third US president to have impeachment proceedings initiated against him (in January 2020), he may well be the first leader of the free world to be impeached twice.

  • Twitter India launches #PowerOf18 initiative for youth civic engagement

    Twitter India launches #PowerOf18 initiative for youth civic engagement

    MUMBAI:  Voting rights emerged as the top response when asked what people would consider the power of turning 18 years old, according to a new survey from Twitter India. With this empowering insight, Twitter is launching today a social initiative called #PowerOf18 aimed at encouraging the youth of India to contribute to public debate and participate in civic engagement in the upcoming election season. Supported by Twitter’s mission to serve the public conversation, the initiative was launched by Jack Dorsey, CEO & Co-Founder, Twitter and  Maya Hari, Vice-President & Managing Director, Asia Pacific, Twitter in a Townhall chat with the students of IIT Delhi today. The campaign launch is marked by an emoji activated by the #PowerOf18 hashtag.

    The research conducted with over 3,600 respondents aged 18 – 30 year olds, comprising Twitter and non-Twitter users, focused on people’s attitude in India in shaping the political and social environment. The survey found an overwhelming 94% of respondents indicating that they would vote in the upcoming elections. 87% of Indians surveyed believe that voting makes you a responsible citizen and more than half (53%) are voting because they want to make a difference.

    The study also pointed towards the rising importance of social media for information consumption. 57% of youth surveyed would turn to social media to find out what’s happening in India and around the world, a percentage higher than all other mediums including newspapers. 69% of Twitter users surveyed always stay up to date with political news and events versus 44% of non-Twitter users.

    Additionally, the survey found Twitter users more engaged in civic discussion versus non-Twitter users. 59% of Twitter users actively engage with and raise concerns to the government on issues that affect them or their community versus 37% of non-Twitter users. Two in three Indian Twitter users believe that they are contributing to the public debate by posting on Twitter.

    In relation, Twitter India aims to encourage the youth of India with #PowerOf18 to leverage the platform for public conversation and vote for the future they seek. As part of the initiative, Twitter is kickstarting the initiative with an online video series on @TwitterIndia featuring young personalities across India such as Indian singer Jassie Gill (@JassieGill), Indian boxer Nikhat Zareen (@Nikhat_Zareen), writer, poet and #MeTooIndia voice Mahima Kukreja (@AGirlOfHerWords), sharing about their inspirations and their view of #PowerOf18. Twitter seeks to work with more like-minded partners and personalities to create awareness of the importance of voting.

    Embeddable Tweet Link: https://twitter.com/TwitterIndia/status/1061882529236557824

    Announcing the initiative at IIT Delhi today, Maya Hari, Vice-President & Managing Director, Asia Pacific, Twitter said, “Our philanthropic mission is to make the world a better place by harnessing the positive power of Twitter. Our company embraces this mission by focusing our support where we can make the greatest impact. Today, we launch #PowerOf18 to encourage the youth of India in taking your place as changemakers and join the most important public conversation for the country – the state and national elections.”

    The #PowerOf18 campaign launch at IIT Delhi, concluded with a Q&A round where students had the opportunity to submit their questions to Jack with #PowerOf18.

    Embeddable Tweet Link: https://twitter.com/jack/status/1061854329789968384

    Several questions focused around Twitter’s role in shaping society and culture, youth activism, upcoming general elections and the importance of voting were raised during the Townhall at IIT Delhi:

    Twitter will be fuelling #PowerOf18 conversations through @TwitterIndia as part of this initiative. #PowerOf18 will serve as a resource for all young Indians to find more information about the elections, support social causes they are passionate about, and join the public conversation. The platform aims to engage more young people in India to contribute to public debate and work with like-minded partners that share the same objective of encouraging civic engagement among the youth.

    The nationwide survey was conducted with 3,622 youth respondents from India between 24 September – 19 October 2018. The survey methodology qualifies the respondents as minimally secondary literate, aged between 18 – 30 years old.

    Follow #PowerOf18 and @TwitterIndia to be a part of the conversation and community.

  • Twitter experiments, doubles its tweet character limit

    Twitter experiments, doubles its tweet character limit

    MUMBAI: Twitter has announced that it is expanding the tweet limit from 140 characters to 280 characters – double the existing limit.

    Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey said that it was is a small change yet a significant move for the company. Twitter product manager Aliza Rosen and software engineer Ikuhiro Ihara said it was a pain trying to cram one’s thoughts into a tweet – a longer limit would be tried out in the languages impacted by cramming.

    The new limits are only available to a “small group” of users, to check out how it works for the initial users before Twitter decides to roll out the changes widely.

    Twitter has planned to leave the old 140-character limit in place for tweets in Japanese, Korean and Chinese because the internal data showed written characters in those languages packed plenty into the allotted space.

    A Twitter blog post observed that only 0.4 per cent of tweets sent in Japanese use the complete 140-character limit, compared to nine per cent of English tweets.

    Twitter, in the last quarter, reported its base of monthly active users (MAUs) was at 328 million. Its growth has not kept pace with the leader Facebook, which has around two billion users, and its sister company Instagram, with 800 million.

  • Bloomberg’s 24/7 live news channel on Twitter soon

    MUMBAI: Bloomberg Media and Twitter have announced they are partnering to create the first-ever 24/7 breaking news network that will be global, live, social and streaming.

    The new live streaming news network will combine the vast global editorial and newsgathering capabilities of Bloomberg with the digital power of Twitter, which has become one of the world’s fastest and primary news distribution channels. Bloomberg will collaborate with Twitter to provide an unprecedented live experience for video news consumers around the world.

    The new network in-development was unveiled today at Bloomberg Media’s NewFront presentation, following a live interview with Michael R. Bloomberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Launching in Fall 2017, it will feature an extraordinary mix of user-generated breaking news video from citizens, curated and verified by Bloomberg editors, along with live video and reporting from Bloomberg journalists around the world. Combining the speed and immediacy of Twitter with the editorial rigor of Bloomberg, the network will be interactive, rich with social content and consumable on any device.

    “Today’s global news consumer wants and needs more than what’s currently available. In an era when most viewers are choosing immediacy over quality in breaking news, traditional media hasn’t kept up. With this new network, we are setting out to reinvent the digital breaking news experience. The powerful combination of Bloomberg’s high-quality journalism and data-backed objectivity with Twitter’s global immediacy, interactivity and reach will create the world’s fastest and most credible modern news source,” said Bloomberg Media CEO Justin B. Smith.

    “This is a great opportunity to extend our global news gathering capabilities to Twitter’s 328 million monthly users,” said Bloomberg editor-in-chief John Micklethwait. “Combining the journalism, data and editorial rigor of Bloomberg with the social content of Twitter will enable us to cover the world in a very new and exciting way.”

    “The stage is set for innovation in news and Bloomberg is taking on that challenge. Twitter’s speed and vast global network of content and commentary combined with the high quality, editorial rigor of Bloomberg is a unique and powerful combination. Our collaboration will bring these forces together through live video and the related conversation,” said Twitter COO Anthony Noto.

    Bloomberg Media is the consumer-facing media organization of Bloomberg LP – the world’s leading multi-platform media company for business and finance. Bloomberg Media draws on 2,600 journalists and analysts in more than 70 countries and delivers news across digital, TV, radio, print magazines and live events. Bloomberg is one of the leaders in global business video and this new network marks a significant expansion of the organization’s industry-leading television and video strategy, extending its reach to Twitter’s global and connected audience around the world.

  • Buyers queuing up to buy Twitter; Disney, Microsoft included

    Buyers queuing up to buy Twitter; Disney, Microsoft included

    MUMBAI: Is Twitter up for sale? If the mounting media reports are to be believed, it most likely is. A queue of potential buyers is reportedly is lining up at its corporate doors. Among them: salesforce.com, Alphabet (google’s parent), Microsoft and Disney.

    Analysts say that it is no surprise that Twitter is in the market for buyers. It has been under tremendous pressure to find revenue streams what with the rising power of Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and other social media outlets.

    Says an industry observer: “They received interest offer from salesforce.com and then probably Jack Dorsey, its CEO, and the board probably decided to pursue it as a strategy to see where it could lead to, and they have been fielding enquiries. For a media company, a Twitter acquisition makes sense as there are not too many companies on the social side out there with a subscriber base of 300 million. This is a good opportunity for them to make a play.”

    Salesforce.com is reportedly working with Bank of America on a potential bid while Disney is working with a financial advisor to evaluate whether they should throw their hat in the ring, says a Bloomberg report.

    Bloomberg appears to be betting on Disney being the front-runner. Reason: both Disney CEO Bob Iger and Dorsey are pretty close. Dorsey is on the Disney board along with Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg. And, Iger has been mentoring Dorsey for sometime now. Additionally, the former has been working on evolving Disney — as its traditional cable TV business is under pressure from cord-cutting and video-on-demand streaming services – into increasing new media plays.

    In recent times, Disney has invested in video streaming service Hulu, Shane Smith digital media company Vice and HBO Now tech partner MLB’s BAMTech. Twitter too has partnered with BAMTech for its live streaming services, says Bloomberg.

  • Buyers queuing up to buy Twitter; Disney, Microsoft included

    Buyers queuing up to buy Twitter; Disney, Microsoft included

    MUMBAI: Is Twitter up for sale? If the mounting media reports are to be believed, it most likely is. A queue of potential buyers is reportedly is lining up at its corporate doors. Among them: salesforce.com, Alphabet (google’s parent), Microsoft and Disney.

    Analysts say that it is no surprise that Twitter is in the market for buyers. It has been under tremendous pressure to find revenue streams what with the rising power of Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and other social media outlets.

    Says an industry observer: “They received interest offer from salesforce.com and then probably Jack Dorsey, its CEO, and the board probably decided to pursue it as a strategy to see where it could lead to, and they have been fielding enquiries. For a media company, a Twitter acquisition makes sense as there are not too many companies on the social side out there with a subscriber base of 300 million. This is a good opportunity for them to make a play.”

    Salesforce.com is reportedly working with Bank of America on a potential bid while Disney is working with a financial advisor to evaluate whether they should throw their hat in the ring, says a Bloomberg report.

    Bloomberg appears to be betting on Disney being the front-runner. Reason: both Disney CEO Bob Iger and Dorsey are pretty close. Dorsey is on the Disney board along with Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg. And, Iger has been mentoring Dorsey for sometime now. Additionally, the former has been working on evolving Disney — as its traditional cable TV business is under pressure from cord-cutting and video-on-demand streaming services – into increasing new media plays.

    In recent times, Disney has invested in video streaming service Hulu, Shane Smith digital media company Vice and HBO Now tech partner MLB’s BAMTech. Twitter too has partnered with BAMTech for its live streaming services, says Bloomberg.