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The main difference between MCP and Rest is that MCP is self described from the very start. REST may have OpenAPI, but it is a later addon, and we haven't quite standardised on using it. The first step of exposing an MCP is describing it, for Rest is is an optional step that's often omitted.
isn't also SOAP self described?
I’m convinced that the only reason why MCP became a thing is because newcomers weren’t that familiar with OpenAPI and other existing standards, and because a protocol that is somehow tied to AI (even though it’s not, as this article shows) generates a lot of hype these days.
There’s absolutely nothing novel about MCP.
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MCP is not REST. In your comparison, its more that MCP is a protocol for discovering REST endpoints at runtime and letting users configure what REST endpoints should be used at runtime. Say i'm building a app and I want my users to be able to play spotify songs. Yea, i'll hit the spotify api. But now, say i've launched my app, and I want my users to be able to play a song from sonofm when they hit play. Alright, now…
so... is this OpenAPI then?
For example, the Kagi MCP server interacts with the Kagi API. Wouldn't you have a better experience just using that API directly then?
On another note, as the number of python interpreters running on your system increases with the number of MCP servers, does anyone think there will be "hosted" offerings that just provide a sort of "bridge" running all your MCP servers?
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honestly, yes - but MCP includes a really simple 'reflection' endpoint to list the capabilities of an API, with human readable docs on methods and types. That is something that gRPC and OpenAPI and friends have supported as an optional extension for ages, but it has largely been a toy. MCP makes it central and maybe that makes all the difference.
At a previous job most of our services supported gRPC reflection, and exploring and tinkering with these APIs using the grpc_cli tool was some of the most fun I had while working there. Building and using gRPC services in golang left a strong positive impression on me.
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Hype, certainly. But the way I see it, AI agents created incentives for interoperability. Who needs an API when everyone is job secure via being a slow desktop user? Well, your new personal assistant who charges by the Watt hour NEEDS it. Like when the CEO will personally drive to get pizzas for that hackathon because that’s practically free labor, so does everyone want everything connected. For those of us who rode…
Unfortunately, I think we're equally likely to see shortsighted lock-in attempts like this [0] one from Slack. I tried to find a rebuttal to this article from Slack, but couldn't. I'm on a flight with slow wifi though. If someone from Slack wants to chime in that'd be swell, too. I've made the argument to CFOs multiple times over the years why we should continue to pay for Slack instead of just using Teams, but y'all…
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In my mind the only thing novel about MCP is requiring the schema is provided as part of the protocol. Like, sure it's convenient that the shape of the requests/response wrappers are all the same, that certainly helps with management using libraries that can wrap dynamic types in static types, but everyone was already doing that with APIs already we just didn't agree on what that envelope's shape should be. BUT, with…
> the only thing novel about MCP is requiring the schema is provided as part of the protocol You mean, like OpenAPI, gRPC, SOAP, and CORBA?