By Andrew Hoblitzell
Publication Date: 2025-12-25 15:12:00
At QCon AI NY 2025, Tracy Bannon gave a talk exploring how the rapid adoption of AI agents is transforming software systems and why companies risk repeating well-known architectural mistakes if they treat all “AI” or “agents” as interchangeable.
Bannon argued that much of the current confusion comes from lumping very different behaviors and risk profiles under the same labels. Bots have been described as scripted responders that respond to predefined triggers, while assistants work alongside humans and remain largely under human control. In contrast, agents are goal-oriented actors who can make decisions and take actions across systems.
Everyone is talking about AI productivity. Very few talk about the architectural amnesia involved. -Tracy Bannon
To illustrate this, Bannon outlined a number of autonomy patterns that commonly occur throughout the software development lifecycle. These ranged from AI-powered tools embedded into existing…
