December 2025 Links

Link post

Here’s everything I read in December 2025. It’s very roughly ordered from what I find most to least interesting.

Hunting For North Korean Fiber Optic Cables: The author uses various internet images and material to piece together how NK has its fiber optics lines laid throughout the country.
Master of His Virtual Domain: What a top Clash of Clans player’s life looks like when working to stay at the top of the leaderboard.
Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs: You can search by guest, year, aircraft.
Jeffrey Epstein’s camera roll as Google Photos: A cloned Google Photos but it’s Epstein’s camera roll, complete with by-name search and favorites.
Los Angeles Fire Damage (visualized): Before and after photos of the devastating 2025 fires. Move the map and click on a dot to view a home.
First Justice Department memorandum from February 2010 arguing that killing Awlaki would be legal: al-Awlaki was the first American citizen to be assassinated by a U.S.-led drone strike. This document outlines the legal justification of killing him.
J.D. Vance Dossier: The full background research on J.D. Vance before he was chosen as Trump’s vice presidential running mate. A very interesting look into what is actually looked at (and how deeply) in high-level politics.
You Get About Five Words
The Lost Generation: Savage discusses being a white (millenial) man in today’s day and age, especially in certain professions, and how they’ve been left out to dry in favor of other candidates. Complete with some stark numbers about hiring rates and demographic changes over time.
Categorizing Extreme Elites
Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT): “The CRT was designed to assess a specific cognitive ability. It assesses individuals’ ability to suppress an intuitive and spontaneous (”system 1”) wrong answer in favor of a reflective and deliberative (”system 2”) right answer.” There are only three questions.
Baird Industrials: The Epitome of a Sweatshop: A look inside an investment bank from the eyes of the analysts and associates in the trenches.
Growing Independence: Jeff gives examples of how he is nurturing independence in his young children.
I have three main motivations here. The first is teaching: eventually they’ll need to make good decisions on their own, and the sooner they start the more practice they’ll be able to get. The second is a kind of long-term laziness: once they can do things for themselves it’s less work for me. And the third is respect: they’re people and as much as possible they should get to choose how their lives go.
Comment, Don’t Message: Jeff makes the case that publicly commenting is often better than private messaging because more people can see it (and thus benefit), others can chime in, and the response burden is less.
Experimental Study on EUV Radiation Characteristics of 1 μm Laser⁃Excited Solid Sn Target Plasma
Former ASML head scientist Lin Nan drives China’s latest EUV breakthrough:
Exclusive: How China built its ‘Manhattan Project’ to rival the West in AI chips
Madrid Trip Report: Joshua talks about his experience traveling in Madrid.
Alice in Wonderland syndrome
Turning 20 in the probable pre-apocalypse
You Look Better When You Try Hard
the 80th percentile displacement: why Russ Roberts (and you) hates modern popular movies
Peter Luger Used to Sizzle. Now It Sputters.: Pete Wells’ scathing review of Peter Luger.
On Israel, Trump Should Echo Reagan: Joshi makes a case for the U.S. weakening its relationship with Israel.
Contradict my take on OpenPhil’s past AI beliefs: Yudkowsky invites the community to explain how/if he was wrong.
Peng Zhao: Citadel Securities (not to be confused with the hedge fund Citadel, although they are closely related) CEO as of December 2025. He assumed the role at a very young 34 after being their chief scientist for less than a year.
Claude Opus 4.5 Achieves 50%-Time Horizon Of Around 4 hrs 49 Mins
Howard Marks (investor):
co-founder and co-chairman of Oaktree Capital Management, the largest investor in distressed securities worldwide
…
He hopes to have average returns during a bull market, while minimizing losses during bear markets due to his belief that losses do more harm than any benefit investors obtain from gains.
Robert Hanssen: An FBI agent who spied for the Soviet and Russian intelligence services for money.
The Hillbilly Elite: JD Vance’s blog from his Yale Law School days.
I think Substrate is a $1 Billion Fraud: Part 1: FCR explains the reasons Substrate could be to good to be true, including the fact that founders have been outed as frauds before and there is basically no evidence to support their claims.
The Money Ick: Robin Hanson gives a bunch of examples of places where we used to feel weird about charging for money, but now do it without a second thought.
Prediction Markets Now: Robin Hanson on the current state of prediction markets.
Kid Door: Jeff builds a mini door for his young children to go through.
Childhood and Education #16: Letting Kids Be Kids: Zvi talks about the child supervision and lack-of-independence pandemic sweeping the nation today. Starting at 10 years old my parents let me do whatever as long as I told them where I was going, if I changed places, and was home by 9:00pm. The leash got much longer as I got older.
I said hello and greeted 1,000 people at 5am this morning: Golden retrievers are loved, and acting like one can increase the amount you are loved (at least while you’re acting like one).
Mar-a-Lago face:
a plastic surgery and fashion trend among American conservative and Republican individuals described as excessive or uniform plastic surgery interventions such as lip augmentation, Botox, and jaw contouring, coupled with heavy makeup, spray tans, fake eyelashes, and dark smoky eyes.
Deal toy: “customized memento or gift that is intended to mark and commemorate the closing of a business deal in finance or investment banking”
Tombstone (financial industry):
a type of print notice that is most often used in the financial industry to formally announce a particular transaction
…
This public disclosure is done in a form that lists the participants in a specified order … The order is so important that, in 1987, five top investment banks withdrew from a syndicate underwriting a $2.4 billion debt issue for the Farmers Home Administration, because they would have been listed under other, smaller regional banks.
Most Badass Intern Story?: Investment bankers share their most badass intern story.
VSCO girl:
VSCO girls are described by some as “dress[ing] and act[ing] in a way that is nearly indistinguishable from one another”, using oversized T-shirts, sweatshirts or sweaters, Fjällräven Kånkens, scrunchies, Hydro Flasks, Crocs, Pura Vida bracelets, instant cameras, Carmex, metal straws, friendship bracelets, Birkenstocks, shell necklaces, and other beach-related fashion. Environmentalism, especially topics relating to sea turtle conservation, is also regarded as part of VSCO culture.
Sankebetsu brown bear incident: Japanese bear attack saga.
Sloth bear of Mysore: Sloth bears are no joke, and this one was particularly aggressive. There are some other pretty cool stories out there of professional hunters tracking down human-killing animals and writing about it.
Jefferies Houston | Culture, Hours, Exits?: Another look inside an investment bank from the eyes of the analysts and associates in the trenches. One of the Dallas Jefferies associates died in 2025.
Moelis Houston PSA: A perspective of what it’s like working for Moelis in Houston.
Dumbest thing you’ve said in an interview: Wall Street folk share the dumbest things they’ve said in interviews.
Examples of Superintelligence Risk: Jeff discusses how superintelligence could take over in some rather boring ways.
2025 in Reading and 2026 Goals
JJ’s Razor: “Malicious or stupid, it doesn’t matter, because your options are the same”
The Wadsworth Constant: “the first 30% of any video can be skipped because it contains no worthwhile or interesting information”
Marchetti’s constant: “the average time spent by a person for commuting each day. Its value is approximately one hour, or half an hour for a one-way trip.”
You won’t believe what gets an email flagged at Goldman: CNBC has the list: LLMs probably obsolete this list, but it’s still pretty funny with things like “Where did my {money}|{funds}|{account} go”, “Paying fees {through|thru} the {nose|a--|butt}”, and “don’t you f*cking understand”. This is just normal banker speak! Trust me, I watched Wolf of Wall Street!
TSMC Arizona Outage Saw Fab Halt, Apple Wafers Scrapped: 1000s of wafers is brutal, especially on a new facility where they’re trying to recoup the cost quickly. My best guess is some bulk gas supply, like nitrogen, failed.
Confessions of a Bicycle Race Promoter: Willis talks about what it was like to run Austin’s Driveway Series.
McMansions 101: What Makes a McMansion Bad Architecture?: Masses and voids, balance, proportion, and rhythm.
Who earns a higher salary than you and the jobs they work: A nice data visualization on who earns what.
Flower Mound, TX: An example McMansion in Texas, including labels on everything that makes it ugly and unappealing.
When the Missing Reasons Aren’t Missing: Estranger parents can look past the reasons their children give them for the estrangement.
Unknown Knowns: Five Ideas You Can’t Unsee
McMansion Hell: A site dedicated to posting about the ugliness of McMansions. There are even educational sections for those out of the loop on architecture.
Inside Dubai’s dark underbelly as models lured to sick ‘Porta-Potty’ parties by men lavishing them with gifts: This is the centerpiece of a rumor about how the Dubai chocolate trend started.
Pro rata: “in equal portions or in proportion”. “In venture capital, it can refer to the Pro-Rata Participation right and mean ‘the right to continue to participate in future rounds so that you can maintain your ownership.’”
Nick Patterson (scientist): “a mathematician … with notable contributions to the area of computational genomics”. He was also a child chess prodigy and worked at RenTech for a while.
Heather Sue Mercer–Duke Football case
Because It’s Easier:
training should be IN-efficient, and difficult. Training is an attempt to change the condition of muscle and connective tissue, the energy system supplying them, and to cause adaptation and improvement. Evading the difficulty one consciously sought in order to produce that change does the opposite. Our nature seeks efficiency and if we aren’t stridently aware of that nature it can sabotage our consciously chosen processes.
David Magerman: “an American computer scientist and philanthropist. He spent 22 years working for an investment management company and hedge fund, Renaissance Technologies.”
Stephen Trauber: According to WSO, Trauber runs a very sweaty shop in Houston.
Ding Xuexiang: “currently the first-ranked vice premier of China and the sixth-ranked member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.”
Le Morne Brabant: A peninsula in Mauritius famous for its “underwate waterfall”.
Kevin Warsh: A potential pick for the 2026 Fed chair position. He was on the BOG from 2006 to 2011.
Timothy J. Heaphy: Lead investigator of the January 6th committee.
Jason Gaverick Matheny:
American national security expert who has been president and CEO of the RAND Corporation since July 2022. He was previously a senior appointee in the Biden administration from March 2021 to June 2022. He served as deputy assistant to the president for technology and national security, deputy director for national security in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and coordinator for technology and national security at the White House National Security Council.
Kojak:
To find an empty parking space directly in front of the building you are visiting, regardless of the time of day, or busy urban location. From the televison series “Kojak”. The title character would race off to locations in Manhattan and always park right in front of the building.
Gish gallop:
a rhetorical technique in which a person in a debate attempts to overwhelm an opponent by presenting an excessive number of arguments, without regard for their accuracy or strength, with a rapidity that makes it impossible for the opponent to address them in the time available.