Governance Overview
MPLP is an open standard. Its evolution is governed by a normative RFC process, transparent versioning rules, and a commitment to stability.
Scope
What MPLP Governs
MPLP defines lifecycle semantics that implementations can adopt to achieve interoperable, observable agent behavior.
✓ Agent Lifecycle
Context initialization, plan creation, execution confirmation, and trace recording.
✓ Governance Semantics
Permission boundaries, role definitions, and coordination rules.
✓ Observability
Structured trace events, audit trails, and lifecycle state transitions.
✓ Interoperability
Schema definitions that enable vendor-neutral agent coordination.
Out of Scope
What MPLP Does NOT Govern
MPLP is a protocol, not a framework. It defines governance boundaries, not implementation details.
✗ Model Training
How LLMs are trained, fine-tuned, or optimized is outside MPLP scope.
✗ Certification
MPLP does not certify implementations or issue compliance badges.
✗ Prompt Engineering
How prompts are crafted or optimized is implementation-specific.
✗ Runtime Execution
MPLP governs semantics; runtimes execute. "Governs, not executes."
Process
How We Evolve
Changes to the protocol follow a strict Request for Comments (RFC) process. Anyone can propose a change, but it must pass through stages of review before adoption.
Draft
Initial proposal. Open for discussion and feedback.
Review
Formal review by core maintainers. Normative changes are refined.
Frozen
Spec is locked. No breaking changes allowed without a major version bump.
Protocol Status & Evolution
Current Status
v1.0.0 — Protocol Frozen
Freeze date: 2025-12-03
Evolution Policy
- →No breaking changes in v1.x series
- →Additive changes via RFC process only
- →Breaking changes require major version
Future Work (Informative)
Collaboration and learning capabilities may evolve in future versions. No timeline commitments are made. Reference implementations are published via official registries.