One of my favourite books about hackers is 'Masters of Deception' about this hacking group in the 1990s. Many of them didn't come from wealthy families. These are kids that are very intelligent; they just happen to be misdirected. Harper Reed More Quotes by Harper Reed More Quotes From Harper Reed This idea of, there's a locked door; how do you open it? You don't necessarily care what's behind it; you're just more excited about opening the lock... It's not about finding the treasure; it's more about defeating the puzzle. Harper Reed puzzle door you care Very smart people are often tricked by hackers, by phishing. I don't exclude myself from that. It's about being smarter than a hacker. Not about being smart. Harper Reed hacker myself smart people Taking time to do something slower than you normally would is a privilege that should not be ignored. Harper Reed something you privilege time I don't drink coffee; I drink a lot of green tea and water. Harper Reed green coffee tea water I spent a lot of time hacking, doing all this stuff, building websites, building communities, working all the time, and then a lot of time drinking, partying, and hanging out. And I had to choose when to do which. Harper Reed choose doing building time We didn't want to waste time by sending our volunteers to Republicans; we sent them to the undecided. Harper Reed waste-time waste want time If there's a wall, we break it down and go through it. Harper Reed down through go break Before I was hired by Obama's team as the CTO for his 2012 re-election campaign, I had certainly never been involved with anything of that nature before. Yet, I somehow knew I could do the job. I attribute that confidence to my experience as a hacker and the subsequent willingness to take risks. Harper Reed job confidence experience nature If you get a WhatsApp message, you're probably going to open it. That's the interesting thing. Harper Reed whatsapp message you interesting Books have literally powered most of my life. Whether as a stress relief when doing hard things or as vacation fodder, they are a constant and important part of my life. Harper Reed my-life vacation stress life My parents are very supportive: they helped redirect my technology attitude and my punkness into positive things. Harper Reed parents technology attitude positive I've had a lot of bosses that I didn't agree with, but the worst boss was very much me myself. So, I can't let myself slack off, and if I do slacking off, I'm the one that's yelling at myself. I've worked with a lot of different employers, and none of them have been as aggressive as I have been. Harper Reed myself me boss worst Campaigns are crazy things. They're half startup, half enterprise. Harper Reed things crazy-things crazy half In the U.S., it's all about turnout, which means you have to appeal to every single Democrat to get them to vote. Harper Reed get you single vote I can only speak to the Democrat side, but for the Democrats, everything is aggressively measured, and what that means is if you're going to use Snapchat, you're going to use it for a reason, not just for fun. Harper Reed you i-can speak fun The digital team who were running Twitter, they weren't just going to put out a tweet for fun. They're going to try and figure out how do we measure the impact. Then they'd tweet it, and if it worked, great. Harper Reed great digital team fun I am patiently waiting for the singularity. Harper Reed patiently am i-am waiting In technology startups, there's a lot of winging it. Harper Reed startups lot technology The team that I had built was all white dudes with the same perspective on things that was at times comfortable and easy, but we weren't as innovative as our competitors. Harper Reed perspective team white easy Not every time you open Messenger do you want an Uber, but when you do want an Uber, it appears. That is the goal. Harper Reed open you want time
