Meta introduced Muse Image last Tuesday, the first image-generation model from its Superintelligence Labs, and by Friday, was already pulling back on a feature that wasn’t received too well. Here’s what happened…
Muse Image was built to power image generation in Meta’s Advantage+ ad creative tool (coming soon). The model uses agentic visual reasoning to interpret full creative briefs rather than keywords, producing on-brand ad variations while swapping styles and adjusting elements with fewer iterations. The model also enabled features like Room Restyling, a new AI shopping tool that lets shoppers upload a photo of their space so Meta AI can place business’ catalog products into their actual room. Cool stuff so far.
However… Muse Image also included a feature that let people create AI-generated images from your public Instagram photos — and that didn’t go over too well with users. Hannah Einbinder, the actress on “Hacks,” criticized the feature, saying it had been turned on automatically, and encouraged users to shut it off.
Then SAG-AFTRA (the actors union) spoke up about it:
“Anything other than a clear and conspicuous opt-in for these types of uses of Instagram users’ images is unacceptable, and an utter miscalculation of public sentiment regarding the obvious dangers and harms inherent in such use… With the dangers of nonconsensual digital replicas well known to all, a feature that encouraged that behavior is unwise.”
Meta said:
“Our intent was to provide a useful creative tool and to give people control over whether their public content could be referenced in this way… We’ve heard the feedback that this feature missed the mark, so it’s no longer available.”
Meta shut the feature down on Friday.
Honestly, what was Meta thinking? Is leadership completely out of touch with user expectations around privacy and safety? And are staff too worried about being replaced by AI to speak up in opposition of these idiotic features before they go live? “Hey guys, let’s release an AI feature that lets people create images of other users in compromising positions without their consent!” The fuck, Meta. My phone number is in my e-mail signature if you guys want to run this stuff by me in the future.
