The Interface Is No Longer the Product
May 20, 2026
For decades, the only way to modify an application’s state was through a human interface. That assumption is starting to break.
Most human-computer interaction has been built around two patterns: issuing commands (typing, clicking, speaking) and manipulating representations (dragging, resizing, arranging, formatting). Every productivity tool ever built is designed around one or both of those. The keyboard, the mouse, the touchscreen. That is the full vocabulary. The interface and the product were, for practical purposes, the same thing.
This essay captures the transitional moment we’re in, where all systems, the software systems we’ve been building for decades have been effectively designed for humans, but we’re already, and increasingly, the users, will be agents.
What do software products look like in that world
