Model Pricing is opaque and frustrating

[peterwwillis]

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It is nearly impossible to determine the price of GitHub Models. This seems like an intentional dark pattern to confuse us about prices so we charge ourselves too much money.

Yes, there is a "calculation" in some of the docs. But it requires you know how much GitHub charges per base model input/output. That information is hidden.

1. First you go to the models page (https://github.com/-user-/-repo-/models) and no pricing link.
2. So you click on Catalog. Still no pricing information.
3. So you click on a specific model (ex. https://github.com/marketplace/models/azure-openai/gpt-4o). Still no pricing.
4. There is a "Pricing" link on the right of the model, which brings you to the GitHub Models Billing documentation page, which has no pricing, and no link to pricing. It has the calculation for tokens, but no prices for models.
5. Back on the model page, in the Pricing documentation of the model, there's a link to "Microsoft AI Foundry Models Pricing" (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/ai-foundry-models/microsoft/?msockid=1775f99b2f8e614e1ba1eb792e496067), so you click that.
6. Now you have a page where you have to select a region (what region is GitHub Models using??), and a currency. The default page only shows Microsoft models (phi). You look around, nothing says "openai" or "gpt4o".
7. You click around a bunch until you finally click "OAIA" (???) which it turns out is "Azure OpenAI Service". This has yet another pricing link (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/cognitive-services/openai-service/) so you click that.
8. Now we have another region selector, this time set to Eastern rather than Central. And now we have 50 pages to scroll through with no Table of Contents.
9. Finally we find the "GPT-4o" section. There are 9 separate rows of possible prices, and two columns, one for batch and one without. With no idea which of these apply to GitHub Models.
10. So you go to Google, and search, and eventually find a "costs and multipliers" page (https://docs.github.com/en/billing/reference/costs-for-github-models). It has prices for specific models (but not all of them). Of course it doesn't contain the model identifier you have to pass in code to actually use the model, or the token limits.

GitHub: If you wanted to have a regular user experience what it's like to work at an enterprise organization like Microsoft, congrats, this was quite kafkaesque.

My suggestion: Put the price on the page with the model.

Please also put the identifier for the model we need to pass in code. I get that it's buried in the Playground widget thing. But if you already know what your API needs to take to use the model, just put it on the model page and make my life easier, please. Make it easier for me to generate cash for you.

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