Want to write? Open an app. Want to browse? Open an app. Want to edit a photo, send a message, check your calendar? App. App. App.
We organized our computers around apps. Our phones around apps. Our entire digital lives around apps.
That era is ending.
The Atomic Unit of Computing
Every era has an atomic unit. The thing you interact with. The primitive that everything else builds on.
Files
Navigate directories. Move data. Run programs on files.
Apps
Learn interfaces. Click buttons. Operate tools.
Agents
State outcomes. Direct teams. Review results.
The App Was a Stopgap
Think about what an app actually is: a tool you operate to accomplish a task.
You learn its interface. You click its buttons. You navigate its menus. You do the work, and the app assists.
This made sense when computers were dumb. When software couldn't understand intent - only instructions. When the human had to be the intelligence in the loop.
But that constraint is gone.
We now have software that understands what you want. Software that can reason, plan, and execute. Software that doesn't need you to click buttons - it needs you to state outcomes.
The app was a stepping stone. The agent is the destination.
The Inversion
Right now, every company is racing to add AI agents to their apps. Xcode has agents. Slack has agents. Your email client has agents.
This is backward.
each with
Agents inside apps
(agents are features)
orchestrates
Apps inside agents
(apps are plumbing)
Agents don't belong inside apps. Apps belong inside agents.
When you direct an agent to prepare for a meeting, it shouldn't matter that research lives in one app, documents in another, email in a third. The agent handles it. The apps become implementation details - plumbing the agent uses, not interfaces you operate.
Who Coordinates?
With apps, you're the middleware. You copy from one tool, paste into another. You track what's done, what's pending. You are the integration layer.
With agents, they coordinate themselves.
- From You copy-paste between tools -> Agents hand off directly
- From You switch contexts -> Agents share context
- From Sequential (one at a time) -> Parallel execution
- From You track progress -> Agents report outcomes
In the app era, you operate. In the agent era, you direct.
What Agents Need
Every paradigm shift requires new infrastructure.
Apps needed an operating system - a shared environment where they could run, access hardware, communicate with each other. Before Mac and Windows, software was chaos. The OS made apps possible.
Agents need the same thing.
Right now, agents are scattered. One in Xcode. One in Slack. One in your browser. They can't see each other. They can't coordinate. They can't hand off work.
For agents to replace apps as the primary way you work, they need a shared environment. Common context. Coordination protocols. A place to live.
They need an Agent OS.
The Next Forty Years
The GUI was 1984. The web was 1994. The smartphone was 2007. Each shift created new giants and obsoleted old ones.
The agent shift is happening now.
The companies adding agents to apps are building faster horses. The ones building Agent OS are building the car.
Forty years of apps. Then what comes next.