America's subprime mortgage crisis of 2007 spiraled into a global financial crisis in 2008. For much of the year, attention was riveted on the presidential primaries. A worsening economy made the election somewhat anticlimactic, but everybody rejoiced with the choice of the first "international" President. With stocks tumbling and major firms seeking billion-dollar bailouts, the impact on reference publishers was particularly gloomy, with many reducing staff and limiting new projects. This was evident at conferences like the American Library Association Midwinter Meeting, where publishers and vendors unveiled fewer new products, instead focusing on breathing new, Web 2.0-friendly life into existing ones. The acquisition of Greenwood by the family-owned ABC-CLIO caught many by surprise. SAGE's acquisition of CQ Press, on the other hand, was less surprising, since much of the publishers' content complements rather than competes. On the e-reference front, 2008 saw a proliferation of products in less-treated categories, including much-needed ventures into popular culture via Greenwood's outstanding--and Dartmouth Medal-winning--Pop Culture Universe and the still--growing field of women's studies via Adam Matthews Digital's amazingly legible microfilm collection, Perdita Manuscripts 1500-1700. Reflecting the astonishing diversity of the subjects covered in last year's reference gems, the list presented in this article is organized by subject to help facilitate collection development practices. Similarly, because consideration of formats is no longer an afterthought but an integral part of librarianship, information about alternative formats is made more prominent throughout.