When I was taking Psychology 101 something hit me about the Rat/Maze/Reward experiments: If I was the rat, I’d dig just exploring the maze. Get a reward for finding the exit? Cool! Necessary? No.

Video games and "productivity tools," they’re really mazes – exercises in curiosity and memory with a beginning and an end. Games are designed to be fun. Interfaces are designed to straighten out the maze. Well, given the nature of software tools, forget making the maze go away. It ain’t gonna happen. Just make it a good maze, dammit.