Muse, the popular English rock band that’s been selling out arenas for decades, is no longer @muse on Instagram, where it boasts nearly three million followers.
That’s because on Tuesday, Meta, which owns Instagram, announced a new “personal AI agent” also called Muse — which is now taking the rock band’s original handle, in an act of what appears to be corporate eminent domain for a long-established username.
Indeed, an archived version of the band’s website shows that just last month, it held the @muse handle on Instagram. Now it’s going by @museband, because Mark Zuckerberg apparently couldn’t settle for his new tool being stuck with the handle @museAI. A similar swap happened on X. Meta’s newfangled AI got the @muse handle, while Muse had to settle for even clunkier @musetheband.
The changes were immediately noticed by the band’s fans, who largely didn’t sound impressed by Meta’s naming scheme. One viral Reddit post claimed Muse were “forced” to change its social media handles, fomenting further outrage.
