Creativity often involves integrating two (or more) familiar entities in some felicitous way way. As the Internet becomes an operating system, mashups promise to be an important locus of creative development. At the recent NERCOMP SIG, "Educational Mash-ups 2," a number of presenters offered persuasive evidence that educators are already making good use of mashups, even if it is also clear that as a group we have only begun to explore what we can do with them. Over the course of the day (April 28, 2008 in Portsmouth, NH), the SIG presenters also gave participants the opportunity to reflect on the limits of what is and is not a "mashup" as well as on the question whether mashups will ever be something that the "masses" can create.

In reviewing Our Cultural Commonwealth, the report on cyberinfrastructure and the humanities commissioned by the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), Gary Wells notes "both the allure and anxiety of radical and disruptive change," and wonders if the academy and the broader public will be up to the cultural and financial challenges.