Hot new protocol glues together AI and apps

Artificial intelligence developers are embracing a new technical standard that's speeding up chatbots' capacity to access the rest of the software we use every day. The faster AI can start using the services and programs that shape our lives and work, the quicker it can save us time and money—and cause us new headaches. Anthropic's Model Context Protocol is a technical definition that standardizes a relatively simple method developers can use to wire up today's AI models and bots to most other programs and data sources. MCP lets users with modest technical skills give conversational bots—like ChatGPT and Claude—the keys to their other digital tools. It's supported by many of AI's biggest players, including OpenAI, Google and Microsoft.