This is a collection of posts from my old Rebolforum:
2026-04-01 14:15:14
This is an interesting business model that enables developers to build AI apps for free, using any AI models (users pay for the AI API calls):
https://developer.puter.com/ai/
I haven't used it for anything yet, but have tried it. It's a dead simple couple lines of JS to add the puter.com library, specify a model to user, and pass a prompt text - all directly from front end code without any other setup from the developer's point of view (not even an API key account setup - users do that when they use the app).
2026-04-01 14:48:14
https://docs.puter.com/user-pays-model/
2026-04-01 15:18:19
This is actually a really useful business model. You don't have to do *anything as a developer to manage costs which users incur, and users only have to pay for their own actual API usage. And there's literally zero configuration or infrastructure setup required from the developer's point of view. Also, it's unlikely that bad actors would try to game the system, since they pay for their own token usage directly.
Interestingly, every puter.com user gets a free monthly allocation of resources, including a baseline amount of storage, database access, and AI credits. Puter.com makes money for usage of certain resources which they provide (database, for example), but they charge 0% markup over the published API fees which come directly from model providers like Anthropic, OpenAI. In comparison, OpenRouter charges 5% markup, and Cursor charges 20% markup over published model fees, for the convenience of using them a middleman. Puter.com appears to be using this as a loss leader to quickly build their platform to millions of users (to sell their storage and other resource services), so it's a win-win for everyone involved.