# The "We Are All In On Agentic" Shame Game **Published:** 2026-09-25 **Author:** Kin Lane **Canonical:** https://apievangelist.com/2026/09/25/the-we-are-all-in-on-agentic-shame-game/ In my [recent conversation with Zdenek Nemec](https://conversations.apievangelist.com/store/2026-09-25-zdenek-nemec/), Z of Apiary and Superface fame, we talked about just how hard it is for agents to onboard with your APIs. I am painfully aware of this in my own work, but Z brings even deeper experience, and pain, from being on the front lines of agentic onboarding. He dove head first into solving this problem just as the AI shift was beginning, around the time I was contemplating leaving Postman. Now, in 2026, as I revisit the subject of onboarding with APIs, Z has shared a retro of what he learned building at the front lines of this important dimension of the AI market, both real and perceived. I spent most of June 2026 trying to decide if I was going to build a startup offering a tool similar to what Superface was attempting to accomplish. I signed up for many different APIs to identify the patterns, and to see where I could deliver a solution that would bridge the gap between what APIs offer today and what AI needs today (and tomorrow). I decided it was too much. There are many things vendors can offer companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies when it comes to making the surface area of their operations more programmable, but I didn't want to be the one building it. What I want to do is: - **Incentivize** companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies to do the work themselves to be more programmable. - **Help them make informed decisions** about which vendors can help them make their surface area more programmable. - **Measure** which areas each vendor contributes to when making that surface area more programmable, and incentivize vendors to do more. And the [Kin Score](https://apis.io/rating/) was born. The purpose of the Kin Score is to drive those three things. In short, I am looking to shame (incentivize) companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies, as well as the vendors they use, into delivering on the agentic promises they are making. Ideally the companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies do the work themselves, but secondarily they should be able to depend on vendors to improve their programmability. The Kin Score is designed to measure both, and to incentivize progressive change in the programmability of your operations. I chose to measure, and to tug on the emotional chords of, the companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies who are talking the agentic AI talk, pushing them to either walk the walk or be called out. This isn't a popular thing to be doing in the current AI market if you want to make friends and raise venture capital, but here I am. I am more interested in moving this conversation forward than I am in making friends and raising venture capital. I am interested in influencing individual companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies to do the work. But if I can lead vendors to be the change as well, I can exponentially increase my impact. You can see this playing out in real time with vendors like Kong. I began writing about Kong back in June with [Kong Konnect Has Two Front Doors and Neither One Is the One I Want](https://apievangelist.com/2026/06/30/kong-konnect-has-two-front-doors/), continued to beat the drum in August with [The MCP Layer Is Being Built Outside The Contract](https://apievangelist.com/2026/08/19/the-mcp-layer-is-being-built-outside-the-contract/), and Kong responded this September, which I wrote up in [Kong Answered The Two Front Doors Post With A Door For Agents](https://apievangelist.com/2026/09/24/kong-answered-the-two-front-doors-post-with-a-door-for-agents/). I tend to get four types of responses to my Kin Score storytelling about vendors: 1. Silence. 2. Delist us. 3. Thanks for the roadmap items. 4. We just submitted a pull request to the API Evangelist repo for our company. Kong falls into category three: adding the items to its roadmap and then being the change I am asking for, and that the agentic market needs. This is the realization of my vision. This is the power and impact of storytelling out in the open. I know my storytelling isn't always comfortable for some companies, but responding the way Kong did is the more comfortable outcome. I am not asking for unrealistic things. Just that your products live up to the stories you are telling about agentic AI. Calling this the shame game is a little mean and link-baity, I admit. However, based on the number of delist requests I get, the silence from vendors who I know through the grapevine are reading my stories and deciding not to talk to me, the number of vendors telling me thanks for the roadmap item, and vendors like Nylas who just [submit a pull request](https://github.com/api-evangelist/nylas/pull/1) to their repo, I feel like naming the game this way is appropriate. I am all about raising the bar. Honestly, it is the only way I can face the current AI market: by calling out vendors for the level of hype they are emitting. If you aren't walking the walk, then you shouldn't be talking the talk. There is a massive amount of hypocrisy right now. You can see it in my recent coverage of Amazon's approach to supporting agents, in [Amazon Wants Agents To Ask Permission, But There Is No Form To Fill In](https://apievangelist.com/2026/09/21/amazon-wants-agents-to-ask-permission-but-there-is-no-form-to-fill-in/) and the follow-up, [Amazon Opened Seller Central To Agents, And Kept The Storefront Closed](https://apievangelist.com/2026/09/24/amazon-opened-seller-central-to-agents-and-kept-the-storefront-closed/). Taking more than you give back is behavior that has long driven me nuts in the API game, but it seems to be sanctioned bad behavior in the AI game. I refuse to accept it. This is why the Kin Score exists. Right now I am measuring and reporting on the programmability of the surface area of companies, organizations, institutions, and government agencies, but I will keep working toward measuring whether a two-way street exists when it comes to playing the agentic AI game.