Who Am I?
Atharva Shah. Software engineer, GTM strategist, and AI-native builder.
I work at AccuKnox doing technical writing, DevRel, and growth engineering for Cloud Native security products (CNAPP, container security, runtime protection). Before that: freelance developer, content writer for TutorialsPoint and FreeCodeCamp, research consultant.
My stack: Python, FastAPI, React/Next.js, AWS, Cloudflare Workers, and whatever LLM API is cheapest this week. Most of what I build now runs with AI in the loop. Not as a crutch. As infrastructure. I build systems that solve problems rather than patching symptoms one line at a time.
The blog runs on a simple thesis. Technical depth without practical application is useless. Marketing without technical grounding is noise. The interesting problems live where those two things intersect. AI has become the forcing function that makes both sides of that intersection move faster.
Four categories. Everything fits into one of them:
Tech and AI - LLMs, cloud infra, security engineering, AI cost optimization, and hands-on implementation breakdowns
Biz and Growth - GTM strategy, technical SEO, content automation, and growth systems that run on code
Money and Career - Compensation decisions, startup equity, freelancing, and working in tech without selling your soul
Entertainment and Culture - Movies, games, books, music. When I have opinions worth writing down
What’s Do I Do?
Nine competency areas. Every post, project, and client engagement maps to one of them:
I am also a serial technical author as well, here’s a few of my best work. See the full catalog: https://www.atharvashah.com/publications
Oh, and don’t forget to check out my favorite extension packs for VSCode; you’ll find the essentials (or maybe some hidden gems) in this exhaustive (or outdated) list.
What to Expect from This Substack?
Not frequent posts for the sake of frequency. Dense posts when there is something worth saying.
No “10 things ChatGPT taught me.” No filler listicles. Just breakdowns of what I built, what broke, what I decided and why. Each post links to related ones. The archive is coherent, not a pile of one-off takes.
Want to get a taste of my best posts? 📍Start Here (Complete Blog Index)
FYI, you might also catch me writing short stories on a whim when I have something to say that doesn’t fit into the above categories. Most of these will be horror, fantasy, or sci-fi because that’s what I read and watch the most. I also write about my personal life and experiences when they intersect with the above themes in interesting ways.
Keeping Myself Busy Professionally
I have shipped technical content across cloud security, AI/ML, and software engineering for 4 years. The full resume is at atharvashah.com if you want the structured version.
The short version: I have written production code, published hundreds of technical tutorials, consulted on growth and dev projects, and spent the last year building AI-powered systems and automation pipelines from scratch. Grew a client’s organic traffic from 2K to 8K monthly visitors in 6 months. Cut another client’s manual processing from 8 hours to 45 minutes with custom Python pipelines. Now building in public at the intersection of AI and growth.
Open to paid work web development, API integrations, AI and automation systems, technical content, growth consulting, GTM strategies, DevRel. Reach me at hi@atharvashah.com.
What I Watch
Movies over TV shows, most of the time. Horror, sci-fi, psychological thrillers, animation. A24 almost never misses. Studio Ghibli is its own category.
Directors I will defend in any argument: Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Gaspar Noe, David Lynch, Christopher Nolan, Wes Anderson, Edgar Wright, Hayao Miyazaki, Makoto Shinkai.
Favorites by genre:
Horror - Suspiria, Possession, Evil Dead, Friday the 13th
Sci-Fi - Blade Runner 2049, Ex Machina, The Prestige, A Clockwork Orange
Thriller - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Nightcrawler, Gone Girl, Get Out
Animation - End of Evangelion, Spirited Away, Into the Spider-Verse, It’s Such a Beautiful Day
Comedy - The Big Lebowski, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Nice Guys, The Wolf of Wall Street
TV - Succession, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Black Mirror, The Boys, Attack on Titan, Sharp Objects
I track everything on Letterboxd. Don’t recommend documentaries unprompted.
What I Read
Fantasy, horror, sci-fi, graphic novels, manga. Kindle for books. Calibre for library management. YACReader for comics.
Fantasy: Malazan Book of the Fallen, The First Law Trilogy, Wheel of Time, The Witcher, Lord of the Rings. Long series preferred.
Horror: H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, Ray Bradbury, Stephen King. Gothic and paranormal adjacent.
Sci-Fi: Philip K. Dick, Discworld, Mistborn, Ready Player One.
Graphic novels: Watchmen, Sandman, Preacher, Sin City, Conan the Barbarian.
Manga: Berserk is the standard everything else gets measured against. Also: Naruto, One Piece, Dragon Ball, Yotsuba.
What I Play
Started with Prince of Persia, GTA, Assassin’s Creed. Found indie games and metroidvanias somewhere along the way and never fully recovered.
Hollow Knight is a masterpiece. Hades too. GRIS, Cult of the Lamb, Shadows of Mordor. Devolver Digital publishes things that shouldn’t exist but do, and that’s exactly why they work.
Classic FPS: Doom. Classic adventure: Tomb Raider, Far Cry. The classics that built the genre: the original CoD and Battlefield runs.
What I Listen To?
Alternative, rock, hip hop, indie, dreampop, rnb, shoegaze, electronic, ambient. Heavy bias toward 80s and 90s.
Favorite artists include Joji, Lana Del Rey, The Weeknd, Playboi Carti, Beach House, Radiohead, Cocteau Twins, Tame Impala, Cigarettes After Sex, Mac DeMarco, Yeat, Clairo, Mazzy Star, Ken Carson, Artemas, Travi$ Scott, Men I Trust, Bladee, PinkPantheress, Charli xcx, Big Thief, Akira Yamaoka, The Smiths, TV Girl, JPEGMAFIA, 100 gecs, Slowdive, Gorillaz, Arctic Monkeys, PARTYNEXTDOOR, Fiona Apple, Adam Green, Drake, Grimes, The Marías, Doja Cat, Lil Uzi Vert, Don Toliver, Strawberry Guy, David Bowie, Deerhunter, Panchiko, Metro Boomin, Duster, Portishead, Deftones, Cults, Led Zeppelin, Mort Garson, Amaarae, The 1975, The Neighbourhood, The Strokes, Arctic Monkeys, The Cure, My Bloody Valentine, The Smashing Pumpkins, Pixies, The National, Interpol, The Killers.
Top Artists 10x10 Chart
Top Albums 10x10 Chart
