Relevance has long been considered a central concept in information science, but it has notoriously resisted satisfactory explanation. Most discussions of relevance have focused instead on potential and/or probable relevance and the design of information services has centered on creating infrastructure for predicting what might be relevant. Other concepts, notably topicality, guide design. We explore the idea that relevance can be understood as creative opportunity, and that this reconceptualization of relevance may provide information scientists an avenue forward for research on relevance. Systems can be designed to afford creative opportunities â new ideas or old stable facts needed for new situations â in addition to (or instead of) topically similar documents that information scientists have identified as [potentially or probably] ârelevant.â