MAN MORTGAGES HOUSE, SELLS KIDNEY TO AFFORD NEW OPENAI API; STILL CAN’T AFFORD TO FINISH THIS HEADLINE
Jeremy Walters, a local app developer, has reportedly sold his car, liquidated his 401k, and put his firstborn child up for collateral just to afford sending “Hello World” through OpenAI’s new o1-pro API.
“I was doing fine with regular GPT-4.5,” said Walters, staring vacantly at his empty bank account. “But then I saw o1-pro and thought, ‘Hey, I wonder what it feels like to be financially ruined by a text completion service?'”
THE PRICING IS TOTALLY F@#KING REASONABLE IF YOU DON’T THINK ABOUT IT
OpenAI’s new o1-pro API costs a mere $150 for 1 million input tokens and $600 for 1 million output tokens, which industry experts describe as “completely reasonable if you’re Jeff Bezos’ wallet.”
Dr. Rich McRicherson, Professor of Economic Masochism at the University of Fiscal Pain, explained the value proposition: “For roughly the price of a used car, you can now generate AI responses that are marginally better than the ones that cost 95% less. It’s like paying for a first-class ticket on a plane that’s going to crash anyway.”
DEVELOPERS EXPLORE CREATIVE FINANCING OPTIONS
Local software engineers have begun forming “API collectives,” where groups of 15-20 developers pool their resources to afford sending a single prompt.
“We take turns,” explained collective member Sarah Jenkins. “Last week was Dave’s turn to ask the API a question. He chose ‘Why are you so expensive?’ The API responded with ‘Because f@#k you, that’s why’ and then charged us $87 for the response.”
OPENAI DEFENDS PRICING WITH CHARTS THAT ONLY GO UP
OpenAI spokesperson Maxwell Profitworth defended the pricing structure with a presentation featuring graphs with no labeled axes and colorful arrows pointing upward.
“What you’re really paying for is exclusivity,” Profitworth explained while lighting a cigar with a hundred-dollar bill. “Nothing says ‘my AI application is better than yours’ like being on the verge of bankruptcy.”
According to a completely real survey we just made up, 97.8% of developers report experiencing “financial FOMO” when using cheaper models, while 104% say they’ve considered selling non-essential organs to afford their API habit.
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS REMAIN THEORETICAL
When asked about practical applications justifying the cost, OpenAI directed us to their website which states: “o1-pro users can solve complex problems like determining how many developers it takes to pay an OpenAI bill (answer: all of them) and calculating exactly how many instant ramen packets you’ll need to survive after paying for our services (answer: infinity).”
Software developer Tim Maxwell has already found creative solutions to work with the new API: “I’ve developed a system where I only use one token per day. At this rate, I should be able to complete my project by the year 2487, assuming I achieve immortality.”
As of press time, OpenAI was reportedly preparing to launch an even more expensive tier called “o1-bankruptcy-inducer,” which will charge users their entire net worth plus interest just for thinking about using it.
