Frank Field points to a fantastic (as in interesting and thought provoking) article on metaphors used to understand legal and internet issues. Gore, Gibson, and Goldsmith: The Evolution of Internet Metaphors in Law and Commentary. From the abstract:

While metaphors aid humans in comprehending abstract concepts and legal doctrines, they also may limit human understanding by selectively highlighting various aspects of an issue while suppressing and marginalizing others. Unreflective use of metaphors can lead lawyers to take for granted the "realities" that metaphors enable. A bad metaphor can also simply lead to bad decision making. For example, Cass Sunstein argues that the "marketplace of ideas" metaphor has turned the right to free expression into a degraded form of commerce.

Substitute "journalism" or "digital media" or "technological frameworks" for "legal doctrines" and you see the same is true as metaphors are applied in those instances. We use metaphors to see and convey understandings of complicated ideas, but we limit the understanding at the same time in those discussions. Journalists do it all the time, when they shorten the number of words it takes to tell the story. They sometimes continue applying the same metaphor to situations where that metaphor becomes out of touch over time. Same goes for many of our discussions with digital media, the internet and technology. Making metaphors apparent is something I am experimenting with in the information work I'm doing, and so I found this article helpful.