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#18 & AI: 2025 Reading List
If you’re new around here, hi! I’m Om, and this is my occasional letter where I share what’s on my mind, my latest writings, articles worth reading from around the web, my recommendations, and some of my photography.
Holidays often signal the looming end of the year. They give all of us a reason to pause, slowdown, reflect, and spend time with people we appreciate. In our increasingly fast, networked world, it’s hard to overstate the need to lower life’s tempo. For me, though, the holidays are also a celebration for another reason.
They also bring a special red-letter day for me. A red-letter day describes a memorable day, usually because something happy or significant happens. The expression comes from printed calendars, where major festivals, holidays, and other special days were marked in red ink, while the rest were in black. So any day worth noting became a red-letter day.
Eighteen years ago, after a heart attack, I ended up in the hospital, fighting for my life. I lived, and since then I’ve celebrated that day as my re-birthday. Why? Because I became a new person. My lifestyle, my habits, and my outlook on life changed—they remade me. I was reborn.
What doesn’t kill you indeed makes you better. That day has become my personal “red-letter day.” You should also read my piece from last year about the miracle of stents and how they have become a key part of cardiac care around the planet and are rapidly improving as a technology.
As someone whose inner energy is defined by my creative process, I usually switch between creation, consumption, and contemplation. The past few weeks have been a time for reflection, stemming from a need to truly find a new center of creative balance.
Since I no longer work as a professional writer, I no longer force myself to do all three in a short time frame. That has also led me to conclude that I don’t need to feed the internet machine with “content” and that I should create only when I feel absolutely confident about sharing something with the wider world.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how the “need to publish” and to constantly “put out content” have contributed to the overall devaluation of the media ecosystem, turning attention into a piñata for monetization. It’s prompted me to work ona longer piece, which I’ll keep refining for a few more days before sharing it with the readers.
Recent Writings
Like I said, I haven’t written much lately. The last noteworthy piece I published was my interview with Rodney Brooks, the godfather of modern robotics, over on CrazyStupidTech. ICYMI, here’s a link. I have also published a handful of pieces about my long-term obsession, fountain pens, in my OmLovesPens newsletter. In a more recent piece, I try toexplain why I love vintage nibs in modern pens. There are many more, but I am not going to bore you. If you are interested in my photography, I’ve been publishing a grab bag of photos as part of an ongoing series called Leftovers.
Worth Reading
All right, now for the good stuff, a.k.a. articles I’ve read elsewhere and think are worth reading. This is a long list, admittedly, lots of “AI” stuff. So buckle up.
- AI researcher Andrej Karpathy’s “2025: The Year in LLM” gives you a tangible overview of what transpired—andhow much—in this relatively young field of large language models.
- Is AI a bubble? Will it burst? My CrazyStupidTech co-writer, Fred Vogelstein, tackles the big question from his perspective, having witnessed a few boom-bust cycles. Highly recommended.
- You don’t even need a product. AI will sell fake stuff. Somewhere in here is a lesson for sellers, but don’t think I am happy about this. We are already at peak consumerism and don’t need more radicalized version of it. That said, the story is totally worth reading.
- As Melanie Mitchell explains, a little “AI” information in the hands of people with big bully pulpits like Thomas Friedman can be dangerous. I quite enjoyed her takedown of his nonsense. Frankly, he’s been spreading nonsense since *The Lexus and the Olive Tree* was published. What a waste of time that was.
- Listening to AI nonsense from men who don’t understand tech, and from those selling them a future vision, it’spretty clear the politics of AI has raced ahead of the technology. A lot of it has to do with “money,” and who gets to make more of it. This is a very good article that explains the politics of AI really well.
Thankfully, I’m not going to push any more AI stuff on you. Here are my two favorite non-tech features I’ve read recently.
- Fugitive Ponzi schemer Noah Musingku reigns over an armed “cargo cult” deep in the interior of one of the world’s most isolated islands. A great read.
- Two strangers. A terrorist bomb. An extraordinary tale of courage. What a story. This is top quality reporting and writing. Stop everything and read this!
Last but not least, check out these beautiful birds.
Congratulations to my friend Seth Levine on publishing his latest book, *Capital Evolution*. He’s a prolific writer whopreviously published *The New Builders*. More details here.
P.S. You should visit my blog. I occasionally post shorter pieces with links and nuggets of goodness about tech, science, culture, and life. You can find my essays, interviews, and photos at Om.co.
December 27, 2025. San Francisco