Emily Berger
META / CONTENT DESIGN MANAGER
“I managed David for nearly four years at Meta in the Reality Labs division, the company's internal incubator, supporting one Meta's most ambitious bets, VR. In my ten years at Meta, David stands out as one of the most impactful, talented, and genuinely fun people I've had the privilege of working with — someone who didn't just do exceptional work himself, but accelerated and motivated everyone around him.
“As lead content designer for the Meta Horizon Store, David owned at platform scale: a full store redesign (including leading our taxonomy, IA, and metadata systems development) that made app discovery dramatically more intuitive and engaging. App Lab, which grew Meta's VR app library by over 500%; Free Trials, which boosted sales for 80% of participating developers; App Subscriptions, which unlocked an estimated $96M annual revenue stream; and new promotions standards that drove a 542% year-over-year increase in VR app sales.
“But the work I'm most blown away by is his leadership to make VR more accessible for everyone. Motion sickness had been one of VR's most pervasive customer pain points for years and a top blocker to broader adoption — well-documented but chronically under-prioritized. David brought empathy, insight and persistence to getting the team to take VR comfort seriously. He collaborated across research, engineering, and policy to build a proper framework and new developer guidelines. He secured VP approval, got 2 teams working on this and scaled the new guidance across all apps, games and third party developers, making VR more inclusive for everyone.
“Beyond all of that, David is simply a joy to work with. He's one of (if not the most!) collaborative people I've managed. David builds credibility quickly and then genuine, lasting relationships. He's also one of the funniest people in any room (a performer and improv comedian outside of work, which honestly tracks). Any team lucky enough to hire David will feel it immediately — in the quality of the work, the energy of the team, and the ambition of what they're able to tackle together.”
Ellis Hamburger
SNAPCHAT / LANGUAGE DESIGN MANAGER
“David is the one of the most thoughtful, conscientious writers I've ever known. He is someone who deeply understands product, but remains effortlessly in touch with popular culture as well.
“David is a master of honing a brand's voice, and expressing it across pretty much any deliverable — from nitty gritty technical work (like Snap's Privacy Policy) to blue sky thinking for our highest-order brand campaigns (like our first TV spot), and even repositions for rapidly evolving products like Spectacles.
“Maybe more than anything, David is such a natural at empathizing with audiences, whether they are users, businesses, partners, and of course, internal teams in need of a solution! I can highly recommend him for any role at the intersection of brand, product, writing, and culture.”
TERENCE KIM
META / PRODUCT DESIGNER
“Working with David Clifford Turner at Reality Labs and Meta was one of those rare PD and CD partnerships where you feel the product getting sharper every week.
“On the Meta Quest 3S Xbox Edition, David owned end to end content with real range. That included onboarding, the in headset experience, and all the small moments that decide whether a launch feels premium or cobbled together. David has great taste, but what impressed me most was the ability to translate messy constraints like brand, legal, localization, and engineering realities into language that still felt human and confident. Decisions came quickly, the rationale was clear, and stakeholders stayed aligned without slowing the team down.
“On countless core browser work like the new tab page, and permissions manager, David turned complicated and easy to misunderstand systems into products users could actually trust. I was fortunate enough to rely on David for real rigor around mental models, consistency, and edge cases, while keeping the language clear, reassuring, and confidence building. What I appreciated most, though, was the human side of working together. David brought a steady, kind, thoughtful presence to the team and made collaboration feel easy. Feedback always felt grounded in shared goals rather than ego, and tricky conversations stayed constructive because David listened first and asked the right questions. That kind of care shows up in the work, and it also changes the experience of building the work with someone. I trusted David, and I genuinely enjoyed partnering together.
“I would jump at the chance to work with David again, and I would recommend him to any team that wants a content designer who can lead, simplify complexity, and raise the bar for craft.”
Matt Esquivel
META / SOFTWARE ENGINEER
“I worked with David on many projects for the Meta Quest Browser. He supported our team's UX designs and text phrasing. I was often impressed by his ability to create solutions that made our UI easy to understand (in a concise way). This is no small feat given the challenges VR brings (due to it being unique to any other paradigms). He used innovative phrasing and excellent design choices to achieve this.
“David is an excellent communicator and thoughtful when navigating problems with competing requirements. Not only is he an excellent verbal communicator, he communicates his designs in a way that is easy for others to digest. To this day, I reference the documents he created.
“Beyond his work talents, David is also a pleasure to work with. Each time we collaborated together was immensely valuable. I miss working with him and hope our paths cross again in the future.”
Sabrina Zhai
META / PRODUCT DESIGNER
“I had the pleasure to work with David as our main content designer while developing the screen reader for Meta Quest — a 0 to 1 net new accessibility feature for our device that enabled blind and low-vision audiences users to experience immersive VR.
“The nature of this work is extremely complex, as the feature is uses mainly auditory cues, requiring users to understand clearly what is happening on the screen without seeing it. This required content design for every single type of component across our platform, needing to evaluate a multitude of edge case to make sure we were system compliant.
“I collaborated extremely closely with David, who delivered a robust & scalable system for our accessibility labeling. David built our accessibility labeling from the ground up, creating an effective and clear template that enabled efficiency and unblocked work for engineers, designers, and various other XFNs in our cohort. The fact this was a scalable solution was extremely crucial to our timelines, as this work was under an extremely tight deadline to ship achieve EAA compliance to avoid an estimated of $400M in fines.
“When faced with prioritization mitigations to meet deadlines, David stayed strong in advocating for the user, strongly pushing back against design mitigations that were not in service for users who needed accessible features. David maintained his position, demonstrating his clear care for his target audience and his work as a content designer. His strong advocacy helped support my own alignment with cross-functional partners in defending the ideal design, and enabled unblocking work for our cross functional partners. Without David, our feature would have been less accessible, more confusing to our target users, and delayed due to alignment blockers.
“I would love to work with David again in the future and strongly recommend not only his work but also his work ethic & collaboration style for any those who have the opportunity to work with him.”
ANDREW DEKKER
META / SOFTWARE ENGINEER
“I worked closely with David over many years as we built the Meta Quest (Oculus) Browser. Designing for VR is a unique challenge - users are essentially alone within the space, and the experience needs to teach them without external guidance.
“David taught me a lot about the importance of content design in successful product creation: how it shapes the overall experience and guides users through complex interactions. He was always a valuable person to have in the room during any user-related discussions - well spoken, empathetic, and proactively aiming for the best results. I'd welcome the chance to work with him again.”
GRACE JOHNSON
META / PRODUCT DESIGNER
“I had the pleasure working alongside David on several projects within VR Store and Search, and I can confidently say he is always a pleasure to collaborate with.
“David brings a combination of creativity, strategic thinking and genuine passion for the work and people around him. He's always easy to work with, and can give confident, grounded strategic guidance quickly to move projects forward.
“Most of all, David is a culture carrier. He's always lifting up the people around him and would be a great fit for any team. I would be thrilled for our paths to cross again in the future, and any company would be lucky to scoop him up! 💕”
EESHAN KUIC
META / SOFTWARE ENGINEER
“I had the opportunity to work closely with David on the Oculus Browser.
“David is thoughtful, thorough, and highly organized. He consistently went deep to understand features and user impact, asking insightful questions and uncovering issues along the way. He effectively connected and aligned with cross-functional stakeholders to ensure our experience met evolving privacy and legal requirements. His attention to detail and user-first mindset were a real asset to the project and I truly enjoyed working with him.
“I would gladly collaborate with him again in the future and look forward to seeing where else his career takes him.”
KUAN-LING TSENG
META / UX RESEARCHER
“I had the pleasure of working with David on the VR browser, and he is a strong strategic thinker with a deep understanding of the product. He brings clarity to complex discussions and consistently aligns decisions with long-term product goals. As a partner, David is highly inclusive and collaborative, creating space for diverse perspectives and strong teamwork. It was truly a pleasure to be on the same team with him.”