David Lin
@davidlinjiahao
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Citizen Journalist ⨀ Grew Duffl to 10M ARR ⨀ Writing threads to satisfy our collective curiosity.
Los Angeles, CA
Joined January 2012
This LA fire is the most destructive in US history. - 29,000 acres destroyed.- 57 billion in economic damage.- 180,000 people evacuated. Here’s EVERYTHING you need to know about the fire:
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2. The estimated damages are upwards of $57B. It is estimated to be the 7th most expensive natural disaster in US history.
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1. The fire is the size of the entire city of San Francisco. Covering ~45 square miles or 29,000 acres.
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8. So why did this fire happen?. A combination of factors:.1. Dry Weather.2. Fast Winds.3. Water Shortage.4. Policy Failure.
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12. Firefighters have known about this risk for years. "If the wind hits the wrong way, it's just gonna burn straight through LA and there is nothing we can do about it.".
the California fires were perfectly predicted with insane accuracy by a firefighter that spoke to Joe Rogan
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4. 180,000 people have been ordered to evacuate. 200,000 are under evacuation warnings. With 7 confirmed deaths, which is likely to increase.
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6. The fire will lead to air pollution that will remain for weeks. Breathing this smoke can kill you. It has been shown to increase risk of lung disease, heart disease & dementia.
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3. The latest response deployment numbers from Governor Newsom:. 🧑🚒 7,500+ Personnel.🚒 1,162 Fire Engines.💧 23 Water Tenders.✈️ 6 Air Tankers.🚁 31 Helicopters.🚜 53 Dozers.
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5. There are 16 investigators looking into the cause of the fire. At least 23 people have been arrested for looting homes in evacuation zones. "Some 95% of wildfires in LA are started by humans."- Fire Chief David Acuna.
People are lighting fires in otherwise non-burning urban areas of LA. Saw this happen first hand at 302 Pico in Santa Monica. Called it in & fire dept & police responded. Stay safe and call in any activity ASAP. We don’t need more flames out here.
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7. Many insurance companies dropped people's fire protection last summer. State Farm announced in March 2024 that it would not renew 72,000 property insurance policies. Approximately 1,600 of those homes were in the Pacific Palisades.
The aftermath of the California wildfires will be important for the entire country:. 1. Private insurance companies have dropped fire protection from many homeowner’s policies or made the rates so high as to be unreasonable for most. They will fight tooth and nail to not pay. How.
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9. LA has experienced little rain over the past few months. With humidity levels dropping below 5%. Santa Ana winds descended with speeds upwards of 70 mph. When you combine dry vegetation and strong winds, you get massive fires.
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This is @shawmakesmagic. - $100k in debt 70 days ago. - Coding till 3am every night to pay rent. - Turns a carzy idea into $2B+ AI project. Here’s how an open source dev rewrote his life in 10 weeks — and is now building AI agents that's eating the world 🧵:
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11. Some fire hydrants stopped working because local water tanks hold only about ~1 million gallons. Water also needed to be pumped upwards to places like the Pacific Palisades.
Anderson Cooper just blamed people using water to save their house as the reason there is no water for the fires. You don't hate CNN enough.
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10. The LA water system is not designed for large fires. It was primarily designed for urban use (~524 million gallons per day). The size of these fires meant we needed to quadruple that usage during peak hours (~2 billion gallons).
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13. A lot of people are blaming LA Mayor Karen Bass.
Mayor Karen Bass literally just read the words "URL" off her script during the press conference instead of the emergency website for the victims of the fire. I think we have a new winner for most incompetent politician in America.
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15. Trump is blaming California.
Here is President Trump three months ago on the famous Joe Rogan episode talking about how California refuses to build water reservoirs and manage their forests to prevent wildfires.
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I've lived in LA for 8 years, I was in the Palisades days before this tragedy. My thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this fire. To those still in LA, please consider evacuating to protect your lungs ❤️.
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16. Conservatives are blaming foreign policy.
BREAKING: Biden just authorized $500 million in aid to Californians who lost everything in the fires. jk. That was for Ukraine.
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14. Bernie is blaming climate change.
80,000 people told to evacuate. Blazes 0% contained. Eight months since the area has seen rain. The scale of damage and loss is unimaginable. Climate change is real, not “a hoax.” . Donald Trump must treat this like the existential crisis it is.
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Whatever the reason, I hope we can all come together during this difficult time to help those in need. If you are in LA and are in need of help, please DM me.
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17. Others are blaming insurance companies.
Insurance companies KNEW fires were likely in the Palisades. But since it's illegal to raise insurance prices (lol California), they just dropped their customers instead.
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@yenluciano I’m so sorry to hear that. This ain’t much but hope it helps. I know yall can hit that goal 💯🙏
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I'm 25. I'm obsessed with learning how to focus. So, I spent 100+ hours studying how founders, authors, and creators achieve more while doing less. Here's what I found on how to focus like the world's top performers:
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@frankdegods As someone who’s worked with Rohun for most of college as a cofounder, I can say this is one of the smartest, most talented and driven guys on the planet. New to Twitter but it’s incredible to see what y’all have built here. You guys are in good hands 🙌 DeGods to the moon!.
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This is the worst single-day loss for an American company. - $600 billion Nvidia value obliterated.- $1 trillion wiped from US stocks.- $220 billion in crypto assets erased. Here’s EVERYTHING you need to know about the startup behind it all — DeepSeek:
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Had the privilege of speaking with my good friend and fellow founder Luke Barwikowski @whatslukedoing -Founder & CEO of @pixels_online. We discussed the power of extreme focus, having a high risk tolerance, and resilience through many near-death experiences, both personally and
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 8. Open Sourcing. Riding on the momentum of the launch, Shaw decides to release the framework he was silently building for 2 years. He called it Eliza: An open source AI Agent framework.
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@garsinii_ Yeah mostly economic, which matters to humans given it’s their livelihoods and homes.
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Look at this kid. He became a billionare by age 23. Here's why everyone who tries to imitate him fails:
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@RyanJRudd I agree, but we do not know the final death count yet. I hope it’s not as bad. I hope you are right, truly.
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Elon Musk is the greatest entrepreneur in history. At 16, he learned Judo to fight bullies at summer camp. Here are 10 of the most influential people on Earth who practice martial arts:
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 8. Instant Karma. Shaw didn't get any allocation for himself during the project pre-sale. But Elijah from earlier (@elijah10T) decides to donate some of his shares to him after getting 16% of total allocation (worth ~$320M today).
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@OurNewWorld2030 Oh interesting, how did I miss that in my research. Thanks for fact checking me.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z I hope this helped someone understand a fascinating story in this new world. If so, would appreciate a like or repost so I can spend mo time doing more research projects like these :).
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 7. Overnight Success. The project sells out in 25mins. They raise 420.69 SOL (~$88K). This is the market cap now:
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@SolBrah It is socially accepted mutilation and child abuse. Archaic practices from the dark ages meant to protect us against bacteria. Completely unnecessary in modern times with proper hygiene.
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@shawmakesmagic 1. The Idea (circa Oct 20, 2024). Shaw replies to @truthterminal the original AI agent who blew up on X. He toys with the idea of recreating Marc Andreessen as an AI bot.
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@AboveTheSky___ Camp fire was $30B, the Chicago fire was $5.7B but the Peshtigo fire which someone commented was actually pretty bad with 2,500 dead.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 10. The Challenge. Shaw writes that Marc AIndreesen (AI) will become the best VC in history. Real Marc Andreessen sees this and posts about it on X:.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z Thank you for reading. If you enjoyed this, share it with someone and follow @davidlinjiahao for more. I write about AI, startups, and other cool things that interest me :).
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 13. Conviction. Now people claim this is just a hype cycle. But Shaw is convinced that this "meta" is the next big wave in Crypto + AI. Most crypto natives already know all this ofc. But it took a normie like me many hours to catch up on all these tweets.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T 5. The AI Hedgefund. Shaw meets the creator of for lunch (@baoskee). They dream about a world where AI makes money for us. They come up with Ai16z - like @a16z but with an AI as the investor.
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Martial artists are the most elite warriors on Earth. But martial arts is not about violence. It is a tool for developing your mind. Here are 4 business principles I learned from training martial arts:
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 6. The Launch. Shaw envisions the first AI VC fund, fully managed by Marc AIndreessen (an AI). He goes home and launches the project using an AI image:
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 12. The Rise. Over the next 2 months, $ai16z grows from $0 to $2B in market cap.
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This is Joon Sung Park. The researcher who is quietly building The Matrix. 50 Days ago, he published a paper claiming to have simulated 1,000 real people to 85% accuracy. Here’s the full story: 👇
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai 4. The "Scam" Scare. Some random guy (@elijah10T) accuses Shaw of scamming him after losing money on DegenSpartanAI. After chatting for 2hrs on Google meets, Elijah decides Shaw is the real deal and invests 80 SOL (~$16K) into his project.
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@DrewGooden The Palisades fire is 6% contained and the Eaton fire is still 0% contained. You can check on Watch Duty app.
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The Name of the Wind is the highest rated fantasy book in the world. I made it into a Visual Novel using AI. Imagine a whole new world of watching books:
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Elon Musk went from sleeping on the office floor to becoming the richest person on the planet. His secret? A single, relentless focus. Here's a simple framework he lives by (and how to apply it in your life) 👇:
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal @degenspartanai @elijah10T @baoskee @a16z 11. Funding Research. Shaw uses this new attention to help fund non-profit research.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal 3. The Beginning. Shaw decides to recreate this crypto influencer using his tweets. And thus, @degenspartanai was born.
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@shawmakesmagic @TruthTerminal 2. The Inspiration. It all started with a reply to a joke:. Random: “Can someone resurrect DegenSpartan with AI?”. Shaw: “Yeah, I can do that.”.
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TikTok is days from getting banned. This is a battle of National Security vs Free Speech. Here are all the FACTS you need to know about the ban:
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Donald Trump launched a Meme Coin. It hit $8B Market Cap in 2 hours. This is the fastest growing meme in history. Here's how it broke the internet:
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We make ~35,000 decisions per day. 1 great decision can change your life. I hyper studied the decision making frameworks of legends like Jeff Bezos, Gary Keller, and Charlie Munger. Here are 10 powerful questions to help you navigate important decisions in 2025:.
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Dinner conversations got boring so I built an AI Aristotle to spice things up. Imagine Pokémon GO but instead of catching Pokémon you are trying to convince philosophers to join your Republic. Zero game dev experience, but AI wrote all the code!. #openai #unity #pokemongo
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This is Sam Ovens. He built a $65M+ education empire by age 26. I spent 40+ hours researching his newest startup. Here are 10 reasons why Skool is the next Facebook:
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Crypto + AI is the greatest collab since Internet + iPhone. This is the next trillion-dollar revolution (and why you are still early):
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I'm 26. I've spent $33M building my college startup. Here are 7 brutal lessons I learned that no one talks about:
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California has spent $23 BILLION on fire prevention in the last 7 years. Clearly, that was not money well spent. Here’s how we prevent future disasters from happening again:
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Steve Jobs famously said:. "Focusing is about saying NO." . But when you say no, you piss people off. Get used to that.
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@RyanJRudd It’s zero percent contained. But I agree on the lives lost. I hope we don’t get as many.
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Energy is the most scarce resource in life. The question is, do you channel it like a laser or is it more like a flash light?
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@shawmakesmagic sorry bro! 🤣 It’s the only high quality video I found of you with good lighting. I didn’t know your full name so I couldn’t find a better one. Next time DM me a head shot 😋. Really love your work. Built a few agents using Eliza. I’m all in.
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@superhominal Which photo are you referring to? The first one? You can right click on a computer and do search on google.
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It's really hard to stay focused without consistent sleep, exercise, and diet. These things have an outsized effects on your energy.
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You must eliminate ALL distractions (notifications, calls, meetings, etc). Isolate yourself and just do the work.
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Elon Musk calls it "Focusing on signal over noise.". Ask yourself: Are your efforts resulting in a better product?. If not, then you're not focused on the right thing.
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Love is the answer. But what is the question?. 1. What should I work on? What I love. 2. Who should I do it with? Those I love. 3. How should I treat myself? With love.
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The reason everyone is freaking out is because DeepSeek R1 is:. 1. Smarter.2. Cheaper .3. Better. Than American models.
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@seanpk - Owning 1 pair of shoes.- Taking cold showers.- Not taking meetings.- Not talking for days.- Reading hardcover books.
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Sam Altman calls focus a force multiplier on work. He writes in his blog:
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@iamkimianora This man is a living saint. Re-reading the surrender experiment this week, I cry every time.
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Marc Andreessen is comparing this moment to the space race between the US and USSR.
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6. Sometimes the best thing to do is to fail. The faster you fail, the faster you learn, and the faster you succeed. It's so hard to admit failure. But if things just aren't working, you might want to try something new.
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@US_DoOM I put a lot of energy into it, but I see your point. The destruction definition is debatable. It matters a lot to us here.
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Gary Keller is the founder of the world's largest real estate company. He asks himself every day:. "What's the one thing I can do, such that by doing it, everything else would be easier or unnecessary?". Here's his co-author Jay Papasan:
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2. Your mental health can cripple your company. Burnout is real and sacrificing mental health for material success will cost you more than you think. Protect your mind like your business depends on it — because it does.
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1. You can’t hustle your way out of a bad idea. People like to say "ideas don't matter, execution is everything.". But starting a newspaper company will never make you a billionaire. You need both a great idea and great execution to be successful.
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It's important to keep things simple. Productivity hacks are just another way to procrastinate on what you need to do. Use whatever system works for you as long as it helps you PRIORITIZE.
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Here's what Mark had to say about the movie:. "People who make movies just can't wrap their heads around the idea that someone might build something because they like building things."
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How to sabotage meetings according to the CIA:. 1. Give long monologues.2. Approach everything with caution.3. Make decisions by committee.4. Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.5. Argue over definitions.6. Re-open decisions made in the last meeting.
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Our degree of presence in this moment is what determines the quality of our future.
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College is one of the the best times to learn about yourself. To build things for fun and explore your genuine intellectual curiosity. A time to find your Ikigai.
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Users report it's better at certain programming tasks as well.
ChatGPT o1 Pro vs. DeepSeek R1. Asked to implement a rotating triangle with red ball in it. Left OpenAI right DeepSeek
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