This matches what I observed running AI agents overnight
for content generation. The temptation is always to add
cost controls inside the application — but that logic
doesn't survive when the agent goes off-script.
The fear of a 3am runaway was real enough that I ended up
building a separate gateway layer just to have a kill switch
that lives outside the application entirely.
"Build vs Buy" is the right framing, but for cost enforcement
and kill switches specifically — building it inside the app
is exactly the wrong layer.
The fear of a 3am runaway was real enough that I ended up building a separate gateway layer just to have a kill switch that lives outside the application entirely.
"Build vs Buy" is the right framing, but for cost enforcement and kill switches specifically — building it inside the app is exactly the wrong layer.