| Main points that came to my mind: - I think the comparison to TCP/DNS/BGP is the more apt one compared to MCP/A2A - Those protocols negotiate capabilities and exchange information about themselves, but not in a self-serving manner of just talking about themselves, but with the goal of ultimately transporting data for a higher layer. Ask Protocol lacks that. - Objects don't exist in a vacuum, but in a context. As the objects will only know about themselves they will always be limited in how to describe themselves best. An LLM that lives on the outside and just gets a static description of an object will be in a much better description to answer an "ask" query. - Given that the existing agent protocols you are putting it in a context in already come with "description" fields and the like, the protocol seems too little of a value add to actually target. e.g. there is no benefit for a MCP server to conform to the prescribed manifest rather than implementing a freeform "ask" tool. - If you want to actually bring the point across that it "occupies a different position" than transport/agent protocols, don't put it into a comparison matrix where you force it into the same schema - ("Open Source" doesn't count as governance) |
The reason comparing to TCP, DNS doesn't make sense is this doesn't replace those at all. The reason I compared against other agent frameworks and things like MCP is because that's the common question people have.
You are right objects don't exist in a vacuum but you are wrong an object that just exposes a description and an LLM reading it from the outside does better. Think about object oriented programming, objects expose and interface but don't reveal all of their internals. Calling the Ask handler could change internal state. Maybe response depends on what object is asking. Maybe the Ask handler might want to call the callers Ask handler too. You can't do that by just exposing a description.
You said the goal is to ultimately transport data to a higher layer. That's not the goal. You are thinking too hierarchical. The relationships between objects is dynamic and the concept of a higher layer makes no sense here since the point is to get rid of the hierarchical nature current agent protocols have.
Keep in mind I built a working system to test the concept. You can download and try it.