This is fascinating. It's true that physical metaphors play a key role in getting people to embrace emerging technology. Two obvious examples are the "desktop"

This is fascinating. It's true that physical metaphors play a key role in getting people to embrace emerging technology. Two obvious examples are the "desktop" and the "slideshow." One is based on the metaphor of a physical desktop. The other is based on a slide projector. You can put a "file" in the "trash" and know that you're getting rid of it, for instance, without knowing anything about the machine's filesystem. The problem is when the purpose and power of a technology are at odds with the original metaphor on which it's based. For example, comparing presentation software to a slide projector helped people understand how to use it, but do humans really think in terms of slides? Before PowerPoint, a lot of great orators moved fluidly through their presentations, pacing through the audience and engaging the crowd. I think that many people embrace and stick with metaphors because they're comfortable, even when they're not necessarily the most efficient or useful. Maybe we could deliver more effective presentations by not fragmenting our ideas into slides. Maybe we could treat our data more responsibly by not believing that it exists in a cushy, omnipotent cloud.