This phenomenal post by Sarah Federman dives into the language we use to define design systems. I personally think this is the best description of the lexicon of design systems I’ve encountered. I’ve always been a bit wary of only referring to a design system as a product as I felt it leads to thinking only about the “what” and less about the “how” and “why”. She does a great job explaining all that stuff in the post. Go check it out.