---
published: true
layout: post
title: 'It Is Called API Design, You MCP Hustlers'
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/apievangelist/api-evangelist-images/it-is-called-api-design-you-mcp-hustlers.png
date: 2026-10-05
author: Kin Lane
tags:
  - MCP
  - API Design
  - Conferences
  - Hype
  - Protocols
  - APIs
---
After [APIDays in London](https://apievangelist.com/2026/09/28/every-talk-at-apidays-london-mapped-to-the-kin-score/), I can now usually tell within the first five minutes when an MCP talk at a conference is going to go nowhere, and was likely just AI-generated. There are clichés to look for, like "APIs were developed for humans, MCP was developed for agents." There are signs that someone is just an MCP hustler, doesn't possess any deep awareness of the industry, and is there to hawk their wares. What were historically just API design decisions have been bundled into a single protocol that promises to fix all of your problems.

Most of these stories start with REST limiting you and MCP freeing you, with no awareness that REST is just one of several API design patterns you can choose from when designing an API. MCP is always positioned as *not* being an API, when it is just a set of API design patterns. When designing an API, you should be choosing the protocols and patterns that meet whatever needs your consumers will have, and whatever resources, procedures and events you need to bring to life to accomplish what your business needs. Choosing HTTP, short- or long-lived HTTP connections, opting to employ sessions or not, and using JSON-RPC message formats is not new. The people behind MCP, the protocol and its implementations, just opted to employ an army of hustlers who lack any awareness of API design to go out into the world and hawk their wares.

If your definition of an API is REST, then your API toolbox is limited. If you think that APIs were developed for humans, despite the evidence of automation in patterns like hypermedia and user agent headers, then you aren't very serious about APIs. If you are articulating MCP versus APIs, you really shouldn't be taken seriously. MCP is a set of API design choices, some good and most not so good, made with a single application in mind. With the amount of money being invested in artificial intelligence, it is no surprise that there has been such a massive uptake of MCP across the market. However, time will tell how well this set of API design patterns stacks up against the other protocols, patterns and interfaces we have at our disposal.

I could spend all day, every day, calling out MCP hustlers on LinkedIn and at conferences. I have better things to be doing. If you find yourself offended by this post, I invite you to come by for a conversation. I'm not as mean as you might think I am, or as others in the space may report. I am happy to go through MCP with you and help you understand the history of how we got here. I truly am invested in there being a literate army of API evangelists and advocates out there. But you have to step up and do the work with me. I am not going to chase you down to harass and shame you. I've seen too many API hustlers come and go with every wave that crashes upon the shore of this industry to chase each one. If you truly want to have an impact, come by for a conversation.