I’m a writer and artist living in San Francisco. In 2013, I moved to the Bay area to found Apptimize, which I ran for 6 years. Prior to that, I worked in high frequency trading in Chicago and NYC at an amazing company called GETCO. 

More extensive background:

I was born in China, grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where my dad was a professor of materials science at the University of Pittsburgh and my mom was a waitress, business owner, restaurant manager, and Chinese teacher. At MIT, I double majored in math and writing (18C & 21W) and lived in East Campus.

Other Huafacts:

• Although I was captain of the fencing team in high school and in college, it’s a nerdy sport and MIT is obviously a nerdy school so I didn’t view myself as athletic until a decade later when a date told me I was more athletic than 99% of people, which caused me to realize that I probably was overdoing it by working out twice a day.
• In high school, I was bored and detached almost all the time except when reading or attending free nerd camps at CMU like Andrew’s Leap or the Pennsylvania Governor’s School for Science. Andrew’s Leap is where I first learned theoretical computer science, which ended up being what I majored in. I hope that my future kids get to always feel like they’re at nerd camp. 
• In 2nd grade, my art teacher Mr. D got me an art scholarship to take free art classes at the Carnegie Museum and CMU for the next decade. I feel sad that I never appropriately thanked him for this gift, or any of the teachers that took an interest in me; I just took it for granted as a dumb kid. Anyway, I mainly make digital art now but my specialty has always been 5 minute portraits done with pen.
• The first writing competition I won (I think when I was 12) was for a poem I wrote about a cat. They published it in a magazine and sent me $50. I like cats and animals in general. A majority of my Facebook feed is non-human animal related and intensely entertaining for me. Send me amusing animal facts/ gifs!
• I love reading. One of my favorite past times is walking uphill with groceries from Whole Foods listening to audiobooks, often memoirs. As a result of some digital fan art I made, I am immortalized in Chapter 86 of one of my favorite books, HPMOR. I have gotten many people to read HPMOR and used to make everyone in my company read it. I hosted parties where all we did was talk about it. I have friendships that are built primarily upon a mutual love of this book. I’ve read it a dozen times end to end and can tell you which chapter by number particular events occur. (The author used one of my ideas as one of his escape tactics, and I think my idea is a better ending because it seems more true to the “AI in a box” intention versus the quasi deus ex machina solution that Eliezer uses. As I’ve aged, my relationship with this book and its characters has changed. For example, I used to aspire to be like Professor Quirrell and fancy myself a Harry Potter but now I see I’m more like the previously despised Hermione and that Quirrell and Harry are not that realistic or ideal.) Anyway, another one of my favorite books is the AI science fiction trilogy (and I almost never finish series because I succumb to googling the rest of the plots because I’m more of a theme, character, and story lover and those rarely sustain for multiple books before falling into predictable patterns, but I’ve read this trilogy 3 times and it never ceases to surprise and escalate) Crystal Society. I also really like Scott Alexander’s whole blog, but also his fiction Unsong. For HPMOR and Unsong, it took me a few tries over a period of years to get past chapter 1, but when I finally did, I loved them. All of the books I’ve recommended here are free, written by people I sort of know, and incredibly unique, smart, and creative. There, now I’m fairly certain I’ve given you at least 1 new, free, amazing, thought provoking, thematically deep, and very long book to read. Your turn: send me good books!
• I love compliments, massages, and Conscious Leadership.  Please give me compliments, offer me massages, and practice CLG. 
•  I love exploring new ideas, creating things, and joking around, often by making fun of myself and others. I love founders and nerds. If you are/ love these things, feel free to ping me!