The Productivity Apps That Don’t Speak Agent Will Lose

Spark Mail shipped a Mac CLI and agent skill hooks last week. Read-only email access is free. Write actions (send, move, archive) are behind the Pro subscription. Readdle also published open-source automation recipes and persona hooks for anyone building on top of it.

I want to set the specific features aside for a moment and talk about what this move represents.

The people who use productivity apps in 2026 are asking a different question than they were three years ago. It used to be: does this app do the thing well? Now it’s also: can my robot assistant work with this app?

That’s a real shift, and it’s not going away. Spark’s CLI is a direct acknowledgment that the app’s users are increasingly expecting their tools to “speak agent”. You can frame it as a niche developer feature if you want. I think that’s the wrong frame.

The users who are most engaged, most willing to pay, and most likely to recommend software to other people are exactly the ones building personal automation pipelines and wanting their apps in the loop. Readdle didn’t have to publish open-source recipes. They did it because they understand who their users are becoming.

Productivity app developers who sit this out are taking a risk. The tools that figure this out early will have an advantage. The ones that don’t will find their users migrating toward whatever does.

On Avoiding Email: Second, Consider the Tool

Last week, I addressed avoiding email with the fundamental question of motivation. Specifically, are you using the easy stuff to avoid doing the hard stuff?

Despite its widespread use, email is not an efficient tool for all types of communication. We’ve overlooked its limitations in our attempt to make it do everything. It’s time we acknowledge that email is often the wrong tool for the job.

Numerous approaches to team communication can free you from the constant need to check your email. While these methods require some initial investment of time and thought, they can ultimately save you hours that would otherwise be spent on lengthy email threads.

For example, I have a scheduled weekly call with my editor where we talk about existing projects for about an hour. During that hour, we get everything handled for the week. Throughout the rest of the week, we keep notes for each other on individual project pages in Notion. Any question that doesn’t fit with a specific project goes on a separate page called “Open Questions.” Then, about a half hour before our weekly call, I go through all open loops and open questions so we can get on the phone and move through them. That one hour every week saves us multiple hours of messages and emails. With a bigger team, that saved time grows exponentially. Additionally, the back-and-forth nature of a phone call often yields better results.

If you are working with a team on a project, a setup like this is way easier than constant email chains with multiple people on it. This gives you one source of truth and one place to go to. It’ll take a little convincing with your team, but once you establish it, they will see the wisdom of it.

Also, try to schedule an in-person meeting regularly to review any open loops. When I was an attorney, every day at 4 PM, my paralegal and secretary could come in and ask me any questions they had. But it was understood they would not pepper me with emails or questions throughout the day.

Finally, there is an ancient bit of technology called the telephone. I put effort into my relationships with coworkers to make them understand that if they have something urgent, they can call me, but it better be urgent. I also make sure they understand that if they email me with something urgent, they will not get a timely response; I’m not your email monkey.

Many other tools are therefore better suited to team communications than email threads. Use your creativity to find a few that can work with your team. Only then can you loosen the grip email can have on your focus.

Avoiding Email: Do the Hard Stuff Instead

I recently heard from a listener asking me how to check email less often. I often get email like this. Indeed, I get this question so frequently that I’d like to answer it with a short series of posts on avoiding email. I have some expertise in dealing with email precisely because I’ve made all the mistakes myself.

One of the initial things you must consider with email is whether you’re using it to avoid doing the hard stuff.

Email is ever-present and it multiplies!. The more email you send, the more you get back. It can become a hamster wheel that never stops. In the abstract, we think of that as a bad thing, but what if getting off the wheel means you’ll be faced with some really hard work? Isn’t it easier just to keep running on the wheel and dreaming of cheese?

We like to complain about email, but it’s easier than many other things. The stakes are usually pretty low, and you can spend days and weeks on it without having to confront the hard stuff. I’m not saying you’d do this intentionally, but the easy path is so much less work.

You can check your email, maybe send a few replies, and feel like you’re getting something done while finding a great excuse to skip the hard work. You need to be honest with yourself about that, particularly if you find yourself checking frequently without good reason. It’s a one way that rebellious organ between your ears avoids doing more work. In that case, you’ll need to take steps. The blissful misery of email is not going to make a difference for you. It’s not going to get you the promotion, close the deal, or make progress on you big thing. The hard stuff, while difficult, is what matters.

Contextual Email

I’ve been trying an experiment where I sort my email contextually. It’s working for me and in this video I share the details.… This is a post for the Early Access and Backstage MacSparky Labs Members. Care to join? Or perhaps you need to sign in?

Setting Up MailMate (MacSparky Labs)

As part of my Rethinking Email series, I’ve installed MailMate on my Mac again. MailMate is the powerful (and nerdy) email solution for the Mac. Here’s a video showing what I’ve done after a few hours of setup, including some custom Key Bindings. There is more to come on this, but here are some early impressions for the Early Access Members…

This post is for MacSparky Labs Tier 3 (Early Access) Members only. Care to join? Or perhaps do you need to sign in?

Rethinking Email – Inbox Serenity (MacSparky Labs)

I’m behind on my email, which made me rethink my email practices and how I can improve them. This is no less than my quest for email serenity. I’ve decided to do this as a series for the MacSparky Labs. Here’s the first entry talking about the problem, potential solutions, and some trouble areas where a specific email can gum up the works. I also share diagrams of some of my email workflows…

This is a post for MacSparky Labs Level 3 (Early Access) and Level 2 (Backstage) Members only. Care to join? Or perhaps do you need to sign in?