Guitarists have had boxes that emulate tube amp distortion for years. Further, some of these model each individual stage or even individual components of the signal chain. Power supply droop due to the non-zero impedance of rectifier tubes is even modelled!
...use both technologies. We go for tube amps or transistor amps with digital modelling of tube amp characteristics. Effects are also a mixture of both, with classic analog devices like tape echoes often replaced by digital simulators for lower cost, higher reliability, programmability and so on, but admittedly not for improved "tone".
Our guitars are another story altogether: hardly anyone plays anything that isn't made of wood, despite more "practical" alternatives. In fact, there is more appreciation than ever of the qualities of fine tone woods. Finally, electric guitarists have been slow to adopt digital pickups, guitar synthesizer systems and so on. Give us our Gibson '59 PAFs and mic our acoustics!
Big media is a relatively recent phenomenon. For most of history, artists dealt directly with the public or were supported by patrons, with no media company help. As media companies fail to create business models that can cope with technology, and rely more on the law, they will simply die. This is of no concern to musicians, as technology has provided cheap tools for recording and distribution of music. The same is increasingly true for movies; in fact, I believe we will see a great flowering of "community cinema" analagous to community theater. Ultimately, we will have access to far more and varied content than media giants provide.
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Guitarists have had boxes that emulate tube amp distortion for years. Further, some of these model each individual stage or even individual components of the signal chain. Power supply droop due to the non-zero impedance of rectifier tubes is even modelled!
...use both technologies. We go for tube amps or transistor amps with digital modelling of tube amp characteristics. Effects are also a mixture of both, with classic analog devices like tape echoes often replaced by digital simulators for lower cost, higher reliability, programmability and so on, but admittedly not for improved "tone". Our guitars are another story altogether: hardly anyone plays anything that isn't made of wood, despite more "practical" alternatives. In fact, there is more appreciation than ever of the qualities of fine tone woods. Finally, electric guitarists have been slow to adopt digital pickups, guitar synthesizer systems and so on. Give us our Gibson '59 PAFs and mic our acoustics!
Big media is a relatively recent phenomenon. For most of history, artists dealt directly with the public or were supported by patrons, with no media company help. As media companies fail to create business models that can cope with technology, and rely more on the law, they will simply die. This is of no concern to musicians, as technology has provided cheap tools for recording and distribution of music. The same is increasingly true for movies; in fact, I believe we will see a great flowering of "community cinema" analagous to community theater. Ultimately, we will have access to far more and varied content than media giants provide.