Interesting article, but somewhat of a false dichotomy.

> This absolutely hasn't eventuated - once again, applications are the problem. Photoshop's codebase and Instagram's codebase no doubt have sophisticated Image objects defined, but each only exists within its gated prison.

Photoshop & Instagram's "Image object" are not what make them good. What makes them good is their "Image object" in the context of their eco-system (app/platform/userbase/DESIGN/integrations/etc).

A building is (and has always been) the sum of it's parts.