What did you learn at Austin ProductCamp?

Why did Paul Young ban himself for a year from speaking at Product Camp Austin?  And what did he learn? The short answer, he learned that you can't be the founder of an event like this and give a "self promotional" talk, and he was chastised heavily by one participant in the Q&A after his talk.  Since you won't be hearing from Paul (at least at ProductCamp) till April 2011, here's a video interview the Examiner did with him at ProductCamp and you can read the full explanation of the self imposed ban on Paul Young's blog. And that's not all, we asked 30 other participants the same question "What did you learn today at ProductCamp Austin?"

 Also, you can learn from the above video about Paul Young's plan for Austin's next ProductCamp in August to "crush Silicon Valley's ProductCamp"

ProductCamp Austin, which is in the "barcamp" family of gatherings,  is a collaborative, user organized unconference, focused on Product Management and Marketing. At ProductCamp Austin held recently at the AT&T Conference Center at MLK and Lavaca Street on the UT Campus,  there were no "attendees," everyone participated in some manner: presenting, leading a conversation, helping with logistics, securing sponsorship, or volunteering.

Above "What did you learn today?" Interviews with Dawna Wright, Don Jarrell, Melissa Muckenthaler, and Louetta Probst

While the original ProductCamp was in Silicon Valley, California, Austin, with inspiration and leadership from Paul Young, thinks they've done "a good job of maintaining that participant-centered, creative and fun style, but are expanding ProductCampAustin into a more comprehensive scope. ProductCampAustin conducts several ongoing event series - the original ProductCamp format, and two Austin originals ProductPotluckAustin and ProductPartyAustin." ProductCamp Austin is "the place" for active, novice and experienced Product Managers and Marketers to develop their craft, learn from each other, network in meaningful ways and have a lot of fun.

Above video from #pca10 "What did you learn today?" Talks with David H Friedman, Chuck Marshall, Melanie Wise, and Kim Brushaber.

The Examiner asked 30 people at Product Camp Austin the same question "What did you learn today at ProductCamp?" and got 30 widely different perspectives from the participants, video from Austin’s ProductCamp at the AT&T Conference Center at UT.  We have over 30 video answers to the question “What did you learn today at ProductCamp” that you can see below and on Itunes

Some of our Product Camp Austin #pca10 interviewees: Tom Evans, Karen Reed, Rachelle McKinney, Amy Kozak, Dawna Wright, Don Jarrell, Tom Baum, Melissa Muckenthaler, Louella Probst, Sue Spencer, Jeffrey Fry, David H Friedman, Chuck Marshall, Melanie Wise, Kim Brushaber, Dawn Crane, Sonny Johns, Mark Magnusson, Amanda Winters, Chris Larson, Tom Grant, Paul Young, Anne Moon, Kathryn, and Erin Young (to name a few).

In the video below isTom Evans, who gave one of the best received talks on sales enablement, answering the "What did you learn today?" question.

 If you attend a future tech event in Austin, watch out!  The Examiner's Paul Terry Walhus might just show up with a video camera and ask you "What did you learn today?"