The study discusses some controversial aspects of lexical innovations, including the status of a new/recent word; the status of a new/recent meaning of a word from general language (or a particular term); „a neological feeling” of the speakers in relation to a new/recent vocabulary item; innovation processes of special vocabularies and of the common lexicon of the Romanian language; the ability of new/recent terms to become polysemantic; polysemy of new/recent vocabulary elements and imminent semantic ambiguities; contextual expansion and semantic disambiguation of new/recent polysemantic vocabulary units; lexicographical treatment of set phrases or of those on the edge of becoming set, formed on the basis of pivot-terms, etc. The research results are based on analysis of examples selected from general and special dictionaries, media, and websites.