https://www.karansampath.com/blog/Recent content in Blog on Karan SampathHugoen-us© Karan SampathWed, 21 Jan 2026 00:00:00 -0800https://www.karansampath.com/blog/2026_joining_anthropic/Wed, 21 Jan 2026 00:00:00 -0800https://www.karansampath.com/blog/2026_joining_anthropic/<p>2026 is going to be an odd year. I anticipate there being a sea change in the broad perception of AI, shifting from a unique piece of technology that one can play with to a real factor in global labor productivity. Humans will likely be forced to move between layers of abstraction at an unprecedented speed, which would raise internal quandaries around their own meaning and purpose. Through it all, there will be a discussion at every level from the personal to the global on what it means to be human, and what it means to be artificial. Our intelligence will be our companion in this transition.</p>https://www.karansampath.com/blog/a_year_of_being_a_founding_engineer/Wed, 02 Jul 2025 00:00:00 -0700https://www.karansampath.com/blog/a_year_of_being_a_founding_engineer/<p>The Valley glorifies the archetype of the founder: taking risks and making hard business decisions while developing a novel product. The fundamental founder role, however, is that of the messiah, since it is those around them make an idea&rsquo;s potential go kinetic. Being a founding engineer then is a unique choice to get on the ride with far less of the glory or upside, coming down to passion in the mission and / or the people. I chose that path a year ago by joining Aryn, an unstructured document intelligence seed stage startup based in Mountain View. I was the employee 10, and we are 15 now, with a number of pivots, successes, and failures in that intervening time. Here are three questions I found better answers to from the preceding year.</p>