Meta's Muse AI Takes Rock Band's Instagram, X Handles — SkimNews
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- Meta rolled out its Muse AI agent on Tuesday, with the product now using the @muse Instagram and X handles the English rock band Muse had controlled for years, forcing the band to adopt @museband on both platforms.
- Muse, the band — which trademarked its name in 1999 — saw its Instagram username change to @museband in July, per The Independent, though Reddit users reported spotting changes as early as June 2026.
- Mark Zuckerberg's initial launch posts about the Muse AI agent mistakenly tagged the band's account, which NYT reporter Mike Isaac called "best bug in twitter history"; Meta called it a "bug."
- Meta previously seized the @Meta Instagram handle from an independent motorcycle magazine around its 2021 Facebook-to-Meta rebrand and took the @threads handle from fashion retailer American Threads roughly a month after launching Threads in 2023.
- Instagram officially prohibits buying, selling, or trading usernames, yet Meta has repeatedly acquired desirable handles from smaller holders without publicly disclosing the circumstances.
- Muse's catalog is "heavily inspired by fears and anxieties surrounding technology and how it might be used for social oppression," per The Independent, adding an ironic edge to fans who noticed the handle swap.
Why it matters: The rock band — whose music has long warned about technology-driven social oppression — lost a username it had used for years to a corporate AI product, continuing a documented Meta pattern of commandeering handles from smaller holders: the @Meta motorcycle magazine in 2021, the @threads fashion retailer in 2023, and now @Muse, all without public explanation despite Instagram's official ban on handle trading.
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