The blue icon does not deliberately misrepresent the true nature of the file. Representing that nature is not its aim. Its job, instead, is to hide that nature—to spare you tiresome details on transistors, voltages, magnetic fields, logic gates, binary codes, and gigabytes of software. If you had to inspect that complexity, and forge your email out of bits and bytes, you might opt instead for snail mail. You pay good money for an interface to hide all that complexity—all that truth, which would interfere with the task at hand. Complexity bites: the interface keeps its fangs at bay.
