On July 15, during a Coldplay concert at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, Astronomer CEO Andy Byron was featured on the kiss cam, sharing a moment with Kristin Cabot, the head of HR at the company. It could have been an adorable impromptu instance if not for their immediate efforts to evade the camera.
Within hours, the clip was circulating online. By the following day, internet detectives had uncovered the identities of both individuals involved. By July 19, Byron found himself unemployed. What transpired in the interim resembled a contemporary morality play filled with a lot of doxxing, corporate responses, and the unyielding online drama cycle.
Yes, infidelity is wrong. However, the internet reacts in bizarre ways to cheating scandals, and in this case, social media users are enthusiastically creating memes from the unfortunate situation. Nevertheless, it’s difficult to look away. As someone who could not avert their gaze, here’s a comprehensive account of how it all began, how it escalated, and its current status.
It commenced with a TikTok: July 15-17
On July 15, Byron and Cabot were present at a Coldplay concert at Gillette Stadium, where they were featured on the kiss cam and promptly attempted to escape after their supposed affair was unveiled to the audience. Chris Martin, the frontman of Coldplay, chuckled and remarked, “Either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy.” The camera then shifted to another company executive beside them, who appeared visibly uncomfortable.
Internet detectives quickly assembled the facts. By July 17, the video had gone viral on TikTok, garnering 10.4 million likes and over a million shares. A new pop culture phenomenon had emerged, leading to countless memes and commentaries dissecting the incident. The most outrageous among them included AI-generated deepfakes of the CEO angrily confronting the crowd for catching him in infidelity.
The method by which the internet pinpointed Byron and Cabot is unclear, but according to 404 Media, it likely involved a combination of publicly accessible facial recognition techniques and social media investigations. In the days following the viral 15-second video, the identities of Byron, Cabot, and their spouses (or Cabot’s ex-husband) circulated across TikTok, Reddit, X, and — perhaps most awkwardly — LinkedIn.
For context: Byron was the CEO (now former) of Astronomer, a New York-based data analytics firm specializing in AI. Cabot held the title of “Chief People Officer,” which is simply a corporate term for Head of HR. While Astronomer was not widely recognized, up until this event, it had unofficially received unicorn status, signifying that it’s a tech startup valued at over $1 billion.
A fabricated apology: July 17
Over the weekend, social media watchers shared screenshots of a purported apology statement from Byron dated July 17. However, a report from The New York Post indicated that this apology was counterfeit, and Astronomer later released a statement refuting its authenticity.
The widely circulated “apology” conveyed a remorseful tone and concluded with a cheesy Coldplay lyric (“As a friend once sang: ‘Lights will guide you home, and ignite your bones, and I will try to fix you.’”). In essence, it was a narrative too enticing not to share, even if proven entirely false.
The Coldplay kiss cam moment achieves peak virality: July 18-present
In the subsequent days, the conversation shifted towards an increasingly toxic direction. The quest for justice on social media often reveals its most negative tendencies. This is not to either defend or condemn Byron or Cabot, but platforms like X quickly became bogged down in a sea of misinformation, including fraudulent statements falsely attributed to Byron and even a rumor alleging that he intended to sue Coldplay.
Several accounts attempted to draw the third employee featured in the clip — standing alongside Byron and Cabot, clearly uneasy — into the fray. Unfortunately, they ended up misidentifying and shaming an entirely unrelated woman, adding another layer of irresponsible collateral damage.
Other corporate entities got in on the action, including NEON, the Philadelphia Phillies, and, surprisingly, the NYC Department of Sanitation, which commented, “Cameras are everywhere.”
As their tumultuous private lives became painfully public, bettors at Polymarket discovered a new fixation. On July 18, trades began emerging with titles like “Andy Byron out as Astronomer CEO by next Friday?” and “Astronomer Divorce Parlay” — a multi-leg trade requiring all outcomes to occur for a payout. This specifically depended on both Byron and Cabot obtaining divorces. The odds peaked at 21 percent after Byron’s wife removed his last name from her LinkedIn profile, before stabilizing around 14 percent at the time of this