The internet led us to believe that we could get things for free. But sometimes money needs to change hands. Should you be paying for Gen AI?
The internet taught us all to expect the riches of the world of thought for free.
We’ve learned over time that in some areas of endeavour that sentiment has caused all kinds of trouble.
Journalism has been stripped to its bones, and somehow many of us were prepared to sell our attention and our data in exchange for the illusion of community (I’m looking at you, Facebook.)
We’re in uncharted territory
When Generative AI came along, we wanted (and largely got) these shiny new tools for free.
The long-term effects of that, and of the Gen AI revolution, are unclear at this point. As publishing guru Adam Tinworth puts it: “AI is an emergent and transformative technology” that has us wandering around in uncharted territory.
(Read his very good piece on AI and publishing here: Meta pirated books — and trained AI on them.)
In the meanwhile, many people are doing everything from playing with Gen AI to using it to change their workflows from the ground up.
In previous posts, I’ve dabbled around the fringes of trying to find out how Gen AI companies fit into bigger social and economic questions. (See those links at the bottom of the post.)
Today, I focus on something narrower.
Should you be paying for Gen AI?
Having spent a year using all sorts of AI tools for all sorts of purposes, I can say one thing for sure: for most people, the free tools are more than adequate. Some are better than others at particular functions but you will generally get a decent response if you construct a decent prompt.
But if you are thinking of paying for a tool, there are two things you need to know: first the actual amount of money that might come off your bank account, and secondly, which tool is good for which purpose (which presupposes that you carefully define what you want to do).
What do these things cost anyway?
To look at the first question first, Sensible Woman has prepared a handy table for you. It gives the prices of the major AI platforms that I put under the social/economic lens in those previous posts. To add that thinking into the matrix, I’ve included a column with a brief comment about the corporate social responsibility (CSR) statements (or not) of the company in question. The second question – which tool for which purpose – will be answered gradually over coming months in upcoming posts.
(In response to a reader request, I’ve added DeepSeek to the mix in this table – this is the new tool out of China. As reported in my previous post, the list below does not include Meta AI or Grok; both are unacceptable on the CSR front.)
Things to note:
These prices are valid at the end of March 2025 as reflected on the company websites.
For ease of comparison, I’ve given the monthly fee – in some cases you might get a cheaper price by paying for a year upfront.
Where a company has a range of pricing tiers, I’ve given two figures: the cheapest and most expensive.
If there was a discount offered at the time I looked, I have not included that as it muddies the waters, and you always end up paying the full price at some point.
I’m aware the table doesn’t look great on a phone screen! I have it in a Word document – contact me and I’ll send that to you.
| Tool/platform | Price | CSR presence? |
| Google Gemini | ZAR429.99/month | Lots of information |
| Microsoft Copilot | ZAR430,00 a month | Lots of information |
| OpenAI (ChatGPT) | USD20 a month (about R365 a month) USD200 a month | Little evidence of CSR commitments |
| Anthropic (Claude) | USD20 a month (about R365 a month) High price: USD30 a month (for a team account) | Lots of information on responsibilities and commitments |
| Perplexity | USD20 a month (about R365 a month) | Very little information on CSR |
| DeepSeek | It’s complicated – they charge a price per token used (see this article DeepSeek Pricing: How Much Does It Cost & Is It Worth It In 2025? and see below for information on tokens). | I could find nothing, and the DeepSeek chat said this: “As of my knowledge cutoff in July 2024, DeepSeek has not publicly released detailed statements or official documentation specifically addressing the three issues you mentioned. ” |
In short, the two big players sit in the same price bracket (R430 a month) and the three popular start-ups all charge USD20 a month – which of course will fluctuate slightly depending on the rand/dollar exchange rate.
Based on the research I did on Deep Seek, it joins Meta AI and Grok as Gen AI tools I don’t use, and won’t cover in my blog posts or newsletters.
AND NOW: THE QUESTION YOU WERE AFRAID TO ASK FOR FEAR OF LOOKING SILLY
Renee, what’s a token?
There in the pricing for DeepSeek was the word “token”. It’s an important and yet hidden cog in the generative AI wheel. Here’s a good definition:
At its core, a token is the smallest unit into which text data can be broken down for an AI model to process. Think of it as similar to how we might break sentences into words or characters. However, for AI, especially in the context of language models, these tokens can represent a character, a word, or even larger chunks of text like phrases, depending on the model and its configuration.
Essentially, tokens are the bridge between raw human language and a format that AI models can process. And here’s the thing: AI models, especially large ones, have a fixed number of tokens they can handle in one go. Critically, the cost of using a generative AI model often depends on the number of tokens processed.
And that’s it for this week. If there’s a question you’d like me to answer, or a topic you’d like covered, contact me here. I can’t promise to answer everything (especially deeply technical questions), but I can generally get us all pointed in the right direction.
Other things I have written
Figuring out which AI tools to use – it’s not a pretty picture – Doing the right thing is complicated. Figuring out which AI tools to use is not just about being cool; it’s a consumer decision too.
What about the jobs? Artificial intelligence and social responsibility – I use AI tools every day – and am starting to think about paying for one of them. Which leads me to wonder about artificial intelligence companies and social responsibility.
How to write a good prompt for AI – A common complaint about AI is that it doesn’t give good answers. That’s because you are asking questions. Instead, write a good prompt.
Why people (even journalists) don’t pay for news – and what to do about it – Journalism battles for revenue as people stop paying.
Why you should pay for local journalism The foundations of journalism have always been local – local court cases, city council decisions, what’s happening at the local high school.
Main picture: Josh Appel, Unsplash
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