Logan Kilpatrick
Logan Kilpatrick was Head of Developer Relations at OpenAI (2022–2024), supporting developers building on OpenAI APIs and ChatGPT. Previously a machine learning engineer at Apple and an open-source policy advisor to NASA. Now at Google, leading Google AI developer relations.
Key ideas
- Context is all you need. The most important element of prompt engineering is giving the model enough context — models have human-level reasoning but zero prior context about you or your goals.
- Go vertical. OpenAI will not build domain-specific products. Founders who specialise in a vertical and fine-tune for it face low competitive risk from OpenAI; those building general assistants compete directly.
- High agency + urgency. The two hiring signals Logan values most at OpenAI: acting on problems without waiting for direction; moving without 50-person consensus.
- GPU-constrained research team. In a GPU-constrained environment, adding a researcher who does not dramatically up-level the group is net negative — more experiments means slower experiments for everyone.
- AI-augmented humans. It is not AI replacing humans; it is AI-augmented humans outcompeting those who are not using these tools.
Appearances
| Source | Date | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Logan Kilpatrick on Building with OpenAI APIs | Early 2024 | Prompt engineering; GPTs product; OpenAI culture; go-vertical advice; Sam Altman board crisis |