Comment by infecto
1 day ago
You are simply a bit too entitled. It's not a premium product and honestly not that expensive in my opinion either (though that is going to depend on your location).
You are more than able to pay for API rates.
1 day ago
You are simply a bit too entitled. It's not a premium product and honestly not that expensive in my opinion either (though that is going to depend on your location).
You are more than able to pay for API rates.
You may want to learn the difference between someone being able to pay API rates and someone willing to pay API rates. I'm sure many people on HN are able to pay API rates and almost all of them aren't willing to pay API rates. The providers know this hence why subscriptions exist. API is almost solely used by companies as almost no private person would be willing to pay that.
“You may want to learn” such choice way to introduce your position which is really not much of one.
If you are going to come and complain about a $200 subscription that gives you $400 worth of API tokens there is only so much room to complain. Only so many lemons can be squeezed. Hope that was a helpful for you.
A normal person pays $0-10 for an AI plan, maybe double that for a business.
$200 is premium.
It is not a premium service, it simply is buying you more tokens. Those $200 gives you at least $400 in API cost tokens.
Don't confused price with "premium service". It was not that long ago that folks would be spending $100-200 on their cable service bundle. You are buying a subsidized product when using the plan and the more you spend the more tokens you get, has nothing to do with being a premium service.
This is a messaging issue on their part, which I think is partially intentional.
It’s not unreasonable for people to expect the most expensive subscription plan to be “premium”. That’s how it works everywhere else. They typically have better margins on the premium plans, and the monthly payment gives them reliable cash flow at that higher margin.
You’re right that that’s not true at Anthropic (or really most AI providers). You’re not even really buying tokens because you get billed whether you use it or not, the tokens don’t carry over like buying API tokens, and they get to dictate what an acceptable way to use those tokens is. They are cheaper though, assuming you actually use them. Which Anthropic et al would really prefer you didn’t.
> It is not a premium service, it simply is buying you more tokens.
The cheap plans are usually semi-unlimited the same way but not as powerful. This isn't simply a matter of buying more tokens.
> It was not that long ago that folks would be spending $100-200 on their cable service bundle.
Compared to OTA that's premium, but more relevantly if most cable buyers are getting a hypothetical $10 bundle then the $100 one is a premium bundle.
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