From Apps to Assistants, how AI is changing our tech taxonomy
Ryan Connolly
Nordic Director of AI Innovation - AI, Data Strategy, Digital Transformation | Keynote Speaker
The days of tapping icons and navigating menus are slowly fading. AI is weaving itself into our everyday lives—often without us even noticing—and transforming our digital world from rigid hierarchies into living, breathing ecosystems.
Reading Time: About 5 minutes
What You Will Learn
Rethinking Our Relationship with Technology
Think about the last time you reached for your phone. Perhaps it was to check the weather, respond to a message, or set an alarm for the next morning. For years, we’ve lived in a digital world where each tiny action is tied to a specific “feature” or a single “app.” Our technology has been mostly reactive: we, the users, poke at icons, and something happens.
But imagine a different morning ritual: You glance at your phone and see that while you were asleep, your digital “assistant” quietly reorganized your schedule after noticing a traffic delay. It also suggested a new coffee spot along your route—one you’ve never tried but might love based on your preferences. You didn’t tap anything. You didn’t manually re-route. It just happened because all the moving parts—calendar, navigation, even the coffee shop’s data—worked together in harmony.
This isn’t science fiction. This is the future of AI as a foundational layer for our digital lives. We’re no longer just upgrading technology; we’re rewriting how it thinks, behaves, and interacts with us. And to capture that profound shift, our old language—“features,” “apps,” “platforms”—no longer seems sufficient.
1. Features → Agents
Traditional View: We used to see “features” as bite-sized functionalities, like turning on your phone’s flashlight or setting an alarm before bedtime.
New Perspective: They’re evolving into agents: autonomous helpers capable of understanding your intentions. They don’t wait for you to tap a button; they predict your needs. One agent might look at your calendar to see you have a busy day tomorrow; another monitors your health stats to recommend better sleep routines. They communicate, learn, and grow—together.
Why It Feels Personal
Agents pay attention in the background, noticing patterns you might miss. By getting to “know” you, they can do more than automate tasks; they can anticipate feelings and contexts, making your digital interactions feel less robotic and more human.
2. Apps → Assistants
Traditional View: Apps were these neat little boxes of functionality. Need a ride? Open a ride-sharing app. Want to chat with friends? Open a messaging app.
New Perspective: Meet your new assistants: proactive, personalized, and context-aware. Instead of juggling multiple apps, you can have one assistant that orchestrates all your tasks. If you say, “I need to plan a dinner party,” it can tap into countless agents—managing recipes, sending invites, booking grocery deliveries—all without you hopping between a dozen different apps.
Why It Feels Personal
Instead of feeling like you’re constantly toggling between tasks, an assistant offers a sense of being “taken care of.” It collaborates with you rather than just waiting for commands, adapting to your habits in real time.
3. Ecosystems → Collectives
Traditional View: We used to talk about “ecosystems” or “platforms” as places where apps lived—like an app store on your phone or laptop.
New Perspective: Now we have collectives of agents and assistants. It’s not just a marketplace of apps; it’s a living network where these agents can negotiate and help each other to fulfill your needs. For instance, if you’re trying to plan a trip, one agent checks flight deals, another monitors local COVID restrictions, and yet another organizes your itinerary. All this happens fluidly and in sync.
Why It Feels Personal
When technology is no longer boxed into separate silos, your digital life feels more unified. You experience it as one continuous flow rather than a series of disjointed app-hopping tasks. It’s akin to having a team of experts at your disposal, each contributing their unique specialty to the conversation.
4. Operating System → Orchestrator
Traditional View: The operating system is the software that keeps your device running—allocating memory, managing files, handling the background processes so your apps can function.
New Perspective: The OS steps into the role of orchestrator: it’s not just passively managing resources but actively coordinating your agents and assistants based on your context and preferences. It “understands” who you are and shapes your entire digital environment accordingly.
Why It Feels Personal
An orchestrator merges the mundane and the magical. It can learn about your preferences—like how you prefer to read the news at night, or how you like your phone to be on silent at certain times—and ensure every part of your digital life respects that. It’s as if your phone or computer gently adapts to your mood without you having to tweak a single setting.
5. Files/Data → Knowledge Graphs
Traditional View: Files are static. Your device has an “internal storage,” and you organize things by folders. Databases store rows and columns of data.
New Perspective: Welcome to knowledge graphs—dynamic webs of interconnected data that evolve in real time. AI agents don’t just fetch a single file; they explore a relationship network. This means your digital devices have a deeper understanding of context, letting them draw insights from multiple sources.
Why It Feels Personal
Because these graphs can connect seemingly unrelated pieces of information—your location, personal interests, upcoming events—agents can deliver surprisingly intuitive suggestions. It’s like having a friend who knows your tastes intimately and always has the perfect recommendation up their sleeve.
A More Human Kind of Tech
At first glance, the idea of AI permeating every layer of our digital lives can sound intimidating—are we giving too much power to machines? Will we become reliant on technology to the point of losing our own agency?
But here’s the flip side: we’ve always shaped technology, and technology has always shaped us. This new AI-driven world holds the potential to be not just more efficient, but more deeply personal. When you’re no longer forced to adapt to rigid “apps” or “features,” you can express your goals freely—“Help me figure this out”—and let the technology choreograph the details.
The shift is already happening in subtle ways. Music apps guess our moods. Email filters learn which messages matter. Smart home devices adjust the temperature based on our habits. These everyday examples hint at a broader revolution, one that’s moving us from isolated features and apps toward a collaborative, ever-evolving tapestry of intelligence.
In this new era, it’s not about flashy “upgrades.” It’s about creating a living digital environment that truly resonates with who we are and who we want to become. AI agents learn alongside us, assistants collaborate with us, and orchestrators keep the backstage running smoothly—ultimately making space for us to focus on what really matters: the human side of the story.
By shifting from hierarchies to ecosystems, from apps to assistants, and from files to knowledge graphs, we’re redefining the metaphors that guide our understanding of technology. In the end, what emerges is a more connected, responsive, and deeply personal digital experience—one that finally feels less like “machine” and more like “us.”
Look out for my next article:
Ask. Listen. Understand. Tell. @Valtech
6moStimulating thoughts, Ryan! I do especially like your thoughts about the "flip side". Will be interesting to see to what extent we can control and always have the possibility to adjust, readjust or even start from scratch.