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from the while-my-guitar-gently-weeps dept.
Each holiday season, thousands of teenagers tear gift wrap off shiny, new guitars. They giddily pluck at the detuned strings, thinking how cool they'll be once they're rock stars—even if almost all will give up before they ever get to jam out to "Sweet Child o' Mine."
For them, it's no big deal to relegate the guitar to the back of the closet forever in favor of the Playstation controller. But it is a big deal for Fender Musical Instruments Corp., the 70-year-old maker of rock 'n' roll's most iconic electric guitars. Every quitter hurts.
[...]The $6 billion U.S. retail market for musical instruments has been stagnant for five years, according to data compiled by research firm IBISWorld, and would-be guitar buyers have more to distract them than ever. So how do you convince someone to put down the iPhone, pick up a Stratocaster, and keep playing?
Seems Fender didn't get the memo: the music of the future is hip-hop and autotuners.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by iamjacksusername on Wednesday November 23 2016, @03:57PM
There are a lot more options these days for how to spend your free time. 50 years ago, if you wanted a hobby, you were limited by what the local shops stocked, by the awareness of hobbies out there and, if you were inclined to participate with other people, how many people in your local community might be interested.. Now, a person who is interested in steampunk poetry can find a large community of others who are also interested; 50 years ago, that person might have picked up the guitar because that is what you did if you wanted to find a community of people who might be interested in your poems ("song lyrics").