Mashup or emigrate

I like to observe the ongoing - and upcoming - convergence of technologies and how the most remote ideas, applications and gadgets can find each other in this weirdly exciting world of "mashups". It seems that the not-so-old wisdom of "automate or emigrate" is turned to "mashup or emigrate". I didn't blink an eye when Starbucks started to sell media, or when Sony cameras were linked to a gps keychain.

But WalMart changing the healtchare IT scene with a quick move does make me much less skeptical. Many of us are pretty conservative when it comes to Web2.0 applications as they often have a very thin or nonexistent business model and we can easily live without their nifty but unnecessary features. However, there is more behind these technologies - meaning Web2.0 ans SaaS mainly - as they can facilitate change and convergence. They are often very simple and efficient, not many bells-and-whistles but they do get the job done. Do you see what I see? It has never been this exciting for creative people! All it takes is a good idea for combining services or products, a bit of business savvy and strong will to make it a product. How about starting a list of examples for successful - or at least very interesting - examples? You can add comments to this page and maybe we can even start a wiki page on this.