There will never be another Rolling Stones, or another Nirvana, because the audience of these bands is now highly specific/specialised as a result of how easy they are to find now.
Ahh there you go, that sums it up perfectly.
You know, you make a good point. I guess I was just cranky. The technology now really does make this a new golden age of music. I can download a few programs for free and suddenly I'm right up there with all the others who are making a bunch of cool sounds. I think I was approaching it from more of a physical instrument side. I had thought that if gibson goes down then maybe its a sign that other physical producers of instruments were headed in the same direction. I jumped the gun on that one.
I would hazard a guess and say that instrument sales overall are probably higher than ever. There has been a massive push in the UK to make sure kids have access to instruments.
https://www.thoughtshift.co.uk/music-and-musical-instrument-retail-trends-and-statistics/
I don't think they're done, they're just scaling back a lot of their other areas of business. This is the first I've heard of it, but I get the feeling that they have made some poor choices, which is what led to this. Guitar sales are still ridiculous.
This is something I hear people saying a lot, and I find it kind of irritating. There has never been a better time for music, ever. It is easier to record, tour, promote yourself etc. than ever before. The amount of bands floating around that you will never hear of is absolutely staggering. There will never be another Rolling Stones, or another Nirvana, because the audience of these bands is now highly specific/specialised as a result of how easy they are to find now. You can't find anything that is uniquely different to something else because there is that much stuff out there.