Dale's Cone of Experience

When I was a graduate student, I learned about Dale's Cone of Experience. I was presented with an image from a text by Dale. It was a black and white cone ranging from the abstract (verbal symbols at the top) to the concrete (direct purposeful experiences at the bottom).

In some ways, Dale was but a blip on the radar for me at the time. However, a few years later when I was teaching I wanted to pull up Dale to share with a class. Imagine my surprise when I found not the graphical cone I was used to but instead a ton of graphics suggesting how people remember varying amounts based on how it is presented. I couldn't track that back to Dale or empirical research of any sort and dismissed it [Here's a post by Will Thalheimer that pretty much summarizes what I encountered.], but I still liked the cone (in a quiet sort of way) for its ability to suggest the various ways in which we might experience something. Essentially, it provides a way to classify various instructional media. [Here's a PDF of an encyclopedia entry on this topic by Mike Molenda, one of my professors at Indiana University.]

So, what do you think? Is it of any use? How does it mesh for you (or not) with what we've read of Mayer so far?