Thousands descended on Austin, Texas to talk tech, play music and network at the annual South By Southwest Festival (SXSW) this year. Laurie Segall from CNN reports that SXSW is the place where start-ups and people in the creative world come to get noticed, and hopefully break out into the wider world.

Laurie met with Ben Parr, a serial web entrepreneur and former editor at Mashable, who discussed the secrets to start-up success. Drawing from his upcoming book, “Captivology: The Science of Capturing People’s Attention” (due April 2015), he believes that the number one factor is building great communities.

Also in the crowd was Xavier Hughes, a leading innovation strategist and big data expert, who talked about the innovation program he helped develop for the Obama administration. Speaking from his experience as the Chief Innovation Officer for the US Department of Labor from 2010-15, Xavier described how the government was making a huge effort to find the top talent from across the country and integrate them as part of the Innovation Fellows Programme.

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