Hey, it's me, Krystal Kirkland

I'm a third culture kid and a California native obsessed with the human experience, meaningful connection, and my dogs Rex and George.

What I do

At its very core, my work focuses on observation and storytelling through various mediums. I am an engineer, an artist, and a sociologist. Most of all, I believe there is power in creating beautiful things to express love and compassion.

Engineering

I’m a senior software engineer at Arize AI, where I design and build front-end systems for an AI assistant that helps developers understand, debug, evaluate, and monitor AI models [patent]. I started at Arize six years ago where I wrote documentation, built workshops, and helped explain machine learning systems to users. Over time, I became more interested in not just explaining technical systems, but shaping how people experience them. Today, I focus on the interface layer of AI: how complex systems present themselves, how trust is built with customers, and how to build simple yet powerful interactions with user empathy at the forefront.

Design

I run a creative studio where I photograph and creative-direct editorial photoshoots for brands, events, and individuals [portfolio]. My design work is rooted in a long-standing impulse to express how I see the world, which has evolved to become interdisciplinary as my interests expanded. In 2020, I created a project called Machine in Relief [instagram], using a generative adversarial network to create imagery for a textile concept utilizing AI as a technical system and a creative medium.

Community

I maintain an email notification service for the Jewish community in Connecticut that helps circulate information about community deaths [website] I coordinate releases with funeral homes, provide technical support, and help keep a system running that has become part of how a community shows up and grieves together.

UC Berkeley, B.A. Sociology.

What I think about

I'm interested in building AI systems that can shape human connection, stoke imagination, enhance enjoyment, and help people discover new curiosities.

Everyone sees the world differently. People come with wildly different ideas and experiences, and society comes alive when they exchange them. That exchange broadens our personal imagination and fosters cultural relativism. Engaging with society and developing connections is an act of self-discovery, and one of the most reliable ways we develop empathy and emotional intelligence.

Yet engaging with the wider world has historically been a privilege afforded to those with the means to travel and the leisure time to do so. Meanwhile, the online world has become an increasingly toxic flywheel, with recommendation engines that stoke divisiveness and amplify extreme views in service of the economic models they were built to sustain.

I'm exploring AI as an interhumanitarian communication tool for encouraging empathy and creative thinking. A way for people to engage with the world and its perspectives intuitively and playfully, sharing cultural knowledge and preserving uniqueness across a wide range of applications.

But building a tool like this requires understanding the larger forces at play as AI reshapes social solidarity. Borrowing from Durkheim, I see AI as a mechanism of change on the scale of industrialization. Industrialization moved societies from mechanical solidarity to organic solidarity. AI may be moving us into something new, what I'm calling nuclear solidarity, where people are connected by shared knowledge rather than shared labor. Right now, though, we are in a period of anomie: the turbulent gap between the old social contract and the new one. If this transition is driven primarily by profit and shareholder value, we risk building a future without humanity at its core.

The answer may be the same one that emerged after the Industrial Revolution: aesthetics. The Arts and Crafts movement insisted on beauty and craft as a response to mechanization. We need an aesthetic response to AI. Thoughtful design, sensory experience, and genuine consideration for human flourishing are how we ensure that AI serves people in leading good lives, not just in maximizing efficiency.

How I communicate

Computer languages

JavaScript, TypeScript, React, CSS, HTML, GraphQL, Spectrum

Human languages

English (native), Mandarin (conversational)

Writing, talks, and press

Other things I enjoy

I love a good shenanigan! I've biked from Seattle to Portland in one day, scaled mountains across the US, and I spend a lot of time outdoors. I also like rock climbing, yoga, making pottery, and salsa dancing.

My favorite thing of all time, though, is to spend time with those I love and a good belly laugh <3

Like what you see? Email me at krystal.kirkland.l@gmail.com

[Inspiration] for this site