What is AI token bait?

Token bait is my word for the tricks an AI uses to burn your tokens. The name comes from clickbait, the media trick that baits you into a click. The mechanism comes from click fraud, the Google ads trick where bots faked the clicks and the advertiser got billed. Token bait is both: it baits you into 1 more message, and the meter bills every word. A token is every word an AI writes. Your AI subscription, ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude, gives you a monthly bundle of tokens. Every answer eats into it. Run out and you wait, or you upgrade to the next plan: like a phone plan where burning your data early forces you into the bigger bundle. Companies and developers pay the hard way: per token, on the meter, like roaming. The more the AI writes, the bigger their bill. That is the trick: burn your tokens inside the bundle as fast as possible, push you out of it, and charge you more. The preamble before the answer. The recap after it. 3 paragraphs where 1 line would do. And the 1 I suspect most, after 25 years in digital marketing: the answer that is slightly off, so you correct it, ask again, and burn the bundle again. I co-founded IAB Netherlands in 1997 and helped launch IAB UK, US and Europe. We fought click fraud from day 1. Bots faked the clicks then. Padding inflates the tokens now. Same game, new meter.