What is MCP?
Model Context Protocol: an open standard developed by Anthropic that provides a universal interface for connecting AI models to external data sources, tools, and services. MCP standardizes how AI applications discover and interact with capabilities (file systems, databases, APIs, code repositories), replacing fragile, custom integrations with a consistent protocol.
My perspective
In practice
MCP is to AI tool use what USB was to hardware peripherals: a universal connector. Instead of building bespoke integrations for every tool an AI agent needs, MCP provides a standard client-server architecture where any compliant tool can be discovered and used by any compliant model. This cuts the engineering overhead of building agentic systems and makes agent capabilities composable and portable across providers.