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Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

arxiv.org

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Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#13

Post by dnlosx »

Retric wrote: post #7
drivebyhooting wrote: post #4

In the past Google et al would hire engineers based on how well they could optimize the infrastructure. Maybe soon companies will look at how engineers can optimize the token efficiency of AI.

That assumes Tokens will remain a meaningful expense. I’m not sure developers will find uses for ever more tokens nearly as quickly as the prices fall.

[dead]

Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#15

Post by senectus1 »

amusing side note:

Was in a meeting reviewing a potential new product, it was going well until they showed us that they had added AI to it (of course they have). It was pretty obviously just shoehorned in, and one part of that obviousness was that they had a column that showed how many tokens it took to make each query.

I asked who is paying for the tokens, they said its included in the license. I said, so is there a budget or is it all you can eat. they said good question they didnt know and would get back to me. I said the reason i asked was just one query there had a 250k token burn on it. and it was a fairly simple query about one device.

then, one of the execs on their side was heard saying out loud "Why are we even showing this to the customers?"

it have us quite a chuckle. But lesson learned... the cost of adding AI to anything isnt really being accounted for let alone the true cost of actually running the AI.

all things AI are going to get more expensive. even if you dont want the AI aspect.

Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#16

Post by NewJazz »

satvikpendem wrote: post #10

Tokenomics is already a word used to describe cryptocurrency economics, not sure why they'd try to redefine it for AI even if a different sort of token is used.

New fad. Forget about the old fad. This one will be old soon, you better get on board before its too late!

Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#18

Post by ares623 »

Retric wrote: post #7
drivebyhooting wrote: post #4

In the past Google et al would hire engineers based on how well they could optimize the infrastructure. Maybe soon companies will look at how engineers can optimize the token efficiency of AI.

That assumes Tokens will remain a meaningful expense. I’m not sure developers will find uses for ever more tokens nearly as quickly as the prices fall.

How are we so confident that prices will fall? Isn't the exact opposite happening, right now, during arguably the most critical part of this whole saga (pre-IPO to make things appear as beautiful and as not-obviously-illegal as possible)? And the only reason they were "falling" previously was for hyper growth.

Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#19

Post by esperent »

sakuraiben wrote: post #2

One thing I've noticed using agents for coding is that they really like to write thousands of unit tests but not dynamically test.

Unit tests are a type of dynamic testing. As opposed to static testing which is linting/typechecking etc.

If you want a difference kind of dynamic testing besides unit tests, have you tried writing it in as a requirement during the planning/PRD phase?

Re: Tokenomics: Quantifying Where Tokens Are Used in Agentic Software Engineering

#20

Post by Retric »

ares623 wrote: post #18
Retric wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That assumes Tokens will remain a meaningful expense. I’m not sure developers will find uses for ever more tokens nearly as quickly as the prices fall.

How are we so confident that prices will fall? Isn't the exact opposite happening, right now, during arguably the most critical part of this whole saga (pre-IPO to make things appear as beautiful and as not-obviously-illegal as possible)? And the only reason they were "falling" previously was for hyper growth.

I don’t think we can extrapolate from current API pricing, but dramatically improving hardware in terms of cost:performance is the underlying reality.

Betting against that you need to assume exponentially more expensive models every year.

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