Karen Datangel was a timid kid with a big imagination, the oldest of three American-born kids from Filipino immigrant parents living in the San Francisco Bay Area. She enjoyed her writing assignments in elementary school and wrote even more in her spare time, so she took her love of writing to her high school newspaper and decided on Journalism as her major in college. She graduated with her B.A. in the field from San Francisco State University in 2011.

She got her biggest break the year before and moved to Los Angeles for a summer to intern for Bonnie Fuller’s site Hollywood Life. There, she was sent to exclusive events, celebrity parties, award shows, and premieres to bring back some juicy gossip. Though she was more of an American Idol fanatic, Karen lived somewhat of a dream as HL’s beat reporter for season 7 of So You Think You Can Dance, the first season to feature all-stars from past seasons.

From there, Karen built a portfolio of editorial work in the lifestyle and entertainment verticals, with featured bylines in Bustle, Fandom, and POPSUGAR just to name a few publications. She has been privileged to interview the likes of Anna Kendrick, Sophia Bush, Lo Bosworth, and Jennifer Siebel Newsom along with many independent artists. In addition to her writing contributions on the Web and in print, Karen kept variations of mildly successful blogs to share her passions and life, amplify her online presence, and build her body of work.

These days, Karen focuses primarily on social media, community management, user support, content, and communications in various industries and previously worked at mid-sized startups and tech giants like Salesforce and Google. She currently works full-time as a Public Relations Assistant with the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD).

San Francisco Giants baseball is a huge part of Karen’s life and had a bit part in her work as well. She was part of the @CafeSFG social media staff for games at AT&T Park (Now Oracle Park) for the 2016 and 2017 seasons as well as the 2018 Fanfest. When she’s not at the yard, she’s usually chatting about the game with followers on her personal Twitter page. She also loves the San Francisco 49ers and Golden State Warriors.

Outside of writing, work, enjoying movies/music/etc, and sports, Karen loves animals, food, fitness, spirituality, reading books on self-help and spirituality (and the occasional celebrity memoir), taking advantage of personal and professional development opportunities, and exploring her city or wherever she is, and can most likely be found hanging out at your neighborhood bar. She is a proud advocate for equality and is an active member of a few philanthropic, social, and networking groups, most notably the Spinsters of San Francisco.

Karen currently lives in San Francisco’s Lower Nob Hill neighborhood.

(Photo by Kim)