A little about me
I design playful, thoughtful experiences at the edge of product, code, and image. A small universe of work, all in one place.
- Based in
- Palo Alto
- Currently
- Tencent · Veeup
- Working on
- AI · Media · Tools
- Reach me
- joychen0709@gmail.com
I work at the seam between product, code, and image — shipping AI-powered media tools by day, and making small interactive experiments by night. I like things that feel intentional but a little playful.
Most recently I've been building cloud media and AI solutions at Tencent, and co-leading Veeup, a platform that automates the tedious parts of job hunting so people can spend more time on the parts that actually matter.
Before that — a Master's at the University of Chicago focused on AI and language, and a B.S. at Wake Forest with a double major in Media Studies. I think the mix shows up in how I work: equal parts systems and stories.
Selected work
Projects, papers, and shipped products — ordered by what mattered, not when it happened.
Cloud Media & AI Solutions at Tencent
End-to-end cloud media solutions for North America clients — streaming, transcoding, and real-time AI inference. Prototyping LLM + media pipelines for caption generation, semantic video search, and creative tooling.
Veeup — LLM-powered job application platform
Co-founded an early-stage platform that automates resume tailoring and job applications. Led product design, prototype-to-MVP build, the first cohort of beta users, and the brand + marketing site end-to-end.
Rapport, social engagement, and robot-facilitated conversation
Designed and ran human-robot interaction studies on rapport-building and perceptions of robot-facilitated conversation. Built Python pipelines for data processing and visualization; ran ANOVA across study conditions.
Web Phishing Detection — MLP / ANN / CNN / LSTM benchmark
End-to-end ML pipeline for phishing URL classification over 10,000+ samples — data cleaning, EDA, feature engineering, dimensionality reduction. Trained and compared MLP, ANN, CNN, and LSTM to find the most effective architecture for real-world deployment.
K–12 CS education with Scratch Encore
Investigated evidence-based approaches to K–12 computer science education. Designed Scratch Encore modules to assess learning outcomes and computational thinking, and evaluated student comprehension to inform curriculum design.
Find the Gate
A small atmospheric game exploring place, memory, and the act of finding. Playable on Itch.io.
Business & Strategy Portfolio
Selected strategy, product, and market work — including marketing analytics simulations, paid search optimization, and competitive analyses — presented with a clean editorial layout.
Speaking & talks
Boosting Game Retention with Voice, AI & Acceleration
Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2026
How conversational voice + AI infrastructure can be deployed to lift retention and engagement in live games.
Tencent Games Developer Summit · Conversational AI Gaming Solution
Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2025
A walk-through of Tencent's conversational AI stack for games — architecture, latency budget, and developer integration.
Experience
2 roles- 2024 — NowNow· Palo Alto, CA
Cloud Media Solution Architect
·TencentAI & media infrastructure for North America clients
- Architect end-to-end cloud media solutions across streaming, transcoding, and real-time AI inference for enterprise clients.
- Translate product needs into technical proposals — bridging engineering, sales, and creative teams.
- Prototype with LLM + media pipelines: caption generation, semantic search over video, and creative tooling.
- 2022 — 2024· Remote
Co-founder
·VeeupResume automation & job-application platform
- Co-founded an early-stage platform that automates resume tailoring and job applications using LLMs.
- Led product design, prototype-to-MVP build, and the first cohort of beta users.
- Designed the brand, marketing site, and core onboarding flow end-to-end.
Education
2 programs- 2023 — 2024· Chicago, IL
M.A. in Digital Studies
·University of ChicagoConcentration: Artificial Intelligence & Language
- Research at the intersection of computational linguistics, generative AI, and media theory.
- Coursework spanning NLP, critical theory, and computational creativity.
- 2019 — 2023· Winston-Salem, NC
B.S. in Business Management
·Wake Forest UniversityDouble major in Media Studies & Communication
- Cross-disciplinary training across business strategy, media studies, and design thinking.
- Independent projects in photography, editorial design, and student-led media.
Toolkit
Design
- Product Design
- Figma
- Design Systems
- UX Research
- Brand & Identity
Code
- TypeScript
- React / Next.js
- Three.js / R3F
- GSAP
- Tailwind
- Python
Media
- Photography
- Editorial Layout
- Storytelling
- Generative AI
- Video & Cloud Media
Want to work together?
I'm always open to thoughtful projects and conversations.