World-Model-Optimizer Turns Agent Traces Into Distilled Open Models, Claiming Frontier Quality at 27% Lower Cost on RouterBench

Experiential Labs on GitHub (Show HN, 2026-07-26)·low signalXBlueskyLinkedInCopy link

experientiallabs/world-model-optimizer, posted as a Show HN on 2026-07-26, distills production agent traces into smaller open-source models via the Tinker API and exposes a routing endpoint that dispatches between frontier and distilled models per request. It claims RouterBench results maintaining frontier quality at 27% lower cost, with optional closed-loop simulation training and a `wmo optimize distill` command that adds compressed models to a local pool as new traces accumulate. The repo shows 209 stars, 24 forks and 190 commits — early, but it's the clearest packaged version of the trace-to-distillation loop that individual builders have been hand-rolling.