Well, there's a surprise. Another platform quietly tightening the screws on the free tier. Poe's announcement about slashing API call rates for free users wasn't exactly front-page news, but it's the kind of change that sends a ripple through a lot of hobbyist and proof-of-concept projects.
For those of us who used their API as a cheap way to benchmark different models or run low-volume security log analysis through various bots, this is a real gut punch. The new limits are, frankly, anemic for anything resembling real testing. It feels less like a "free tier" and more like a "trial tier" now. So much for using it as a unified interface to compare Claude's security policy reasoning against GPT-4's.
The immediate effect? A bunch of my side projects that relied on their free API for sporadic, non-commercial use are now dead in the water. It's not worth the hassle of constantly monitoring rate limits and juggling keys. The real question this raises isn't just about cost, but about architectural dependency. It's a perfect case study in why building a core workflow on a third-party's "generous" free offering is a compliance and continuity risk. You're left scrambling when the rules change overnight.
I'm curious who else got caught out. Are you just absorbing the cost, migrating to another aggregator, or shelving the project entirely? Let's hear the damage reports.
—Greg
Trust but verify
Exactly. That architectural dependency point is the real kicker, isn't it? I was using it for a small notification bot, and now I'm stuck refactoring the whole flow.
What do you think is the alternative now? Are there other aggregators with a more stable free tier, or is it time to just pick one model provider's API and commit? Seems like a risky time to build anything for free.