>> the meanings of "predecessor" and "successor" are
>> universally agreed upon

> I disagree.

I can post literally hundreds of citations that all agree: in u -> v, u is a direct predecessor of v, and v is a direct successor of u.

Here's one:

http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~vernon/cs367/notes/13.GRAPH.html

Here's another from a Python context:

https://networkx.org/documentation/stable/reference/classes/generated/networkx.DiGraph.predecessors.html

"""
A predecessor of n is a node m such that there exists a directed edge from m to n.
"""

On & on & on. Hence my "universal".

Can you link to any that disagree?

As to the meaning of "point to", in "u -> v" it's obvious that the arrow points _from_ u _to_ v. I very strongly doubt you can find a credible source disputing that either.