Meta has acknowledged that the similarity between its AI app Muse and OpenClaw is not a coincidence. In a statement on X on 22 September 2026, Nat Friedman, head of product at Meta’s Superintelligence Labs (MSL), said that Muse was “definitely heavily inspired” by OpenClaw as a product, but that the app was “developed from scratch.”
Friedman said the Meta team liked OpenClaw and wanted to build a safer alternative that would be easy to use safely and could scale to billions of people. Praising OpenClaw creator Peter Steinberger’s approach, Friedman said he purchased hundreds of Mac minis for the MSL team after using OpenClaw in January. OpenAI had brought Steinberger on board earlier this year following the project’s success.
The controversy grew after Ansh Nanda, co-founder of the AI app, described Muse as “literally OpenClaw for normies.” In an exchange with Muse, it was suggested that the similarity between the files of the two systems was not a coincidence but a match. Users also noted that the two assistants had the same file names in their workspaces and that the content of Muse’s SOUL.md file, which defines the AI tool’s personality, communication style and behavioral boundaries, was nearly identical.
In response to a question about why Muse used the file names and SOUL.md content from OpenClaw almost exactly, Friedman said they believed Steinberger had designed these elements correctly. A Meta spokesperson said they had nothing further to add to Friedman’s statement.
Muse recently rose to number 1 on the US App Store. The data shows that when platforms and market reach are directly compared, the app is progressing faster than ChatGPT did after its launch.
Why it matters
This statement is prompting renewed debate over the line between drawing inspiration in AI products and using a project’s distinctive operating structure. In particular, the overlap in the file names and SOUL.md content raises the question of whether the claim of technically independent development, on its own, explains the similarities visible in the user experience. The issue concerns not only developers familiar with OpenClaw’s approach but also the broad audience that will use Muse, because an assistant’s personality and behavioral boundaries directly affect the relationship it establishes with the user. Muse’s rapid rise on the US App Store is taking the debate beyond a narrow circle of developers, while Meta’s more detailed rationale regarding the use of similar elements remains undisclosed.
Background
Meta is not a new name in the FikirPilot archive: we have published 38 news reports mentioning the name in the last 90 days; the most recent is dated October 3, 2026.