The big fear of *n?x old-timers seems to be the symbolic interface. They see icons and mascots as mittens keeping us from direct manipulation of concepts. Right they are, but hypocritical, because symbols are what it’s all about. Words — letters — are symbols like a life-saver for save, though better and more flexible ones. Fewer buttons and more hypertext-like links. Symbols are only good when they are either abstract (a, b, c) or really analogues, when you can do to them easily what it’s hard to do with the real thing.