Nick Hanauer is co-founder and partner in Seattle-based venture capital firm, Second Avenue Partners. He has managed, founded and financed over thirty companies, creating aggregate market value of tens of billions of dollars. For example, he co-founded aQuantive, which sold to Microsoft for $6.4 billion, and was the first non-family investor in Amazon. He also serves as a Director for The Democracy Alliance and as a board advisor to the policy journal Democracy. He has a degree in philosophy from the University of Washington, is married with two children and lives in Seattle, Washington. At O’Reilly’s Next:Economy conference in San Francisco, the venture capitalist talks about the value of studying philosophy, his investment strategy and how to think independently. Link to it now.