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Overview 

What Is It?

A web application that combines data from two or more sources and creates something altogether new or different with those sources. At their most basic, mashups take data from a source and filter it through another source or application. For a low-end example, look at  iPhone Maniacs, a news site which mashes together Flickr photos and blog postings/news headlines tagged as "iPhone". For a more elaborate example, try MoreMap.com, which takes data from the web about weather, traffic, movies and even earthquakes and mashes their locations through Google Maps. Applications like SearchMash allow users to search for a keyword, and find not only search results but also related blog entries, Flickr photo feeds and more.

Mashup Editors

Mashup editors like Yahoo Pipes provide users with a way to create mashups through a graphic, user-friendly interface. Yahoo Pipes uses the metaphor of 'pipes' as connections between applications and data. Users select applications that provide content or data (such as a blog posting, or small database) and then use Pipes to form a connection with another application (a mapping application for example). Users then use Pipes' various sets of filters to refine the data and come up with an altogether new mashup application. Other mashup editors include Microsoft PopFly and Google Mashup Editor.  

Uses as an Instructional Technology

Mashups reinforce the concept of making data sets reusable. What one student collects and properly formats can be nearly infinitely reused in mashup applications to generate new visualizations. Using and/or creating mashups can provide a foundation for discussing and/or studying Web 2.0, digital culture and the continual interconnection of web-based application with public and private data sets.