Compute & Cost
Tokenmaxxing
The strategy of scaling workload through model usage instead of headcount: where a task can be expressed in tokens, it is done in tokens. This can resolve bottlenecks and lower costs, or burn money if nobody measures what the tokens earn. Without a counter-calculation, tokenmaxxing is just a more modern word for uncounted overtime.
An example
A team finds that more context and more detailed intermediate steps improve results, and turns both up. Quality does rise, and the bill grows tenfold while response time goes from two to eighteen seconds. Neither is noticed until the monthly invoice arrives, because testing used twenty cases rather than twenty thousand.
A closer look
The idea: where a task can be solved with more model passes, computing time is the cheaper resource compared to additional positions. It is available immediately, scales up and down, and needs no onboarding.
Why it matters
The term mockingly describes a real temptation: tokens are the one lever that reliably improves something, and so it gets turned until costs forbid it. The sober counter-question is the point beyond which the additional effort brings no measurable gain. An eval can answer it in an hour: the same cases at half and double the context, compare hit rates. As a rule, the point after which nothing happens comes considerably earlier than assumed.
Commonly misunderstood
The math only works if checking grows along with it. Otherwise more results are produced than people can judge, and the bottleneck moves from generation to review.