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Ian Cairns
Co-Founder at Freeplay - helping product teams build with generative AI
Ian Cairns is a proud father currently taking a break to recharge and homeschool. He has a diverse background in various organizations such as Twitter, Gnip, govtech, and Development Seed. Ian is dedicated to continuous learning and is grateful for his experiences.
In terms of education, Ian Cairns holds a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in English Literature from the University of Colorado Boulder. He also gained further knowledge through a Summer Programme in English Literature at the University of Oxford.
Throughout his career, Ian has held key positions including CEO & Co-Founder at Freeplay, VP of Product & Design at Firstbase, Director of Product, Developer Platform, and Senior / Group Product Manager at Twitter, along with various roles at Gnip, Watershed Strategy, and Development Seed.
With a strong background in product management, design, and strategy, Ian Cairns brings a wealth of experience to any organization he collaborates with. His passion for technology and innovation, paired with his leadership skills, make him a valuable asset in the industry.
Highlights
Loved this line for VCs: Invest in companies with good evals.
"If somebody pitches you something related to AI, I would ask them: How are you measuring what's good and bad?
If they come back with an eval that's well principled/well thought through and the results are bad, invest.
They know how to measure the problem, they'll optimize it, they'll figure it out."
New episode of Deployed! 🎙️
Kyle Nesbit's been an engineering leader at Google for 17 years. He drops a ton of practical knowledge about how to build AI products that actually work — and how to build engineering teams that consistently deliver better AI products.
Example: the need to constantly iterate on evals.
