60% Claude cost cut by converting code to images and having the model OCR it

This is the kind of hack that only makes sense once you actually understand how token pricing works, and that's exactly why it's spreading on Hacker News faster than most funded startups' launch posts. It is also a quiet indictment of how arbitrary current LLM pricing schemes are, since a JPEG of your prompt can be cheaper than the prompt itself. Don't be shocked if labs patch this loophole within weeks, but for now it is a neat reminder that the token economy has some genuinely weird corners.