In response to Kevin McElhone's original question: from my vantage
point of working with pianos, the market has already collapsed!
Nowadays it seems the typical home model player piano is slated to
end up in the landfill, or even worse, to appear as the star of a
YouTube video where some oaf with a sledgehammer capers around the
splintered remains.

This is a situation which bodes ill for the field in general, as
these pianos also served as an introduction to mechanical music
(and as "first projects") for many enthusiasts.  Their decline has
already been discussed at length, and various good explanations
offered.  I agree with Mike Nicholls and others: a major factor is
that younger generations are focusing on the more recent past.

I predict that as the years go by a market -- somewhat diminished
-- will remain for certain less common items: good musical boxes,
especially elaborate cylinder boxes whose exposed mechanisms provide
a certain eye appeal; likewise Violanos, which are fascinating
machines; and large orchestrions, for those with the money and the
room to display them.  Musicians wanting a self-playing piano will
increasingly opt for electronically-controlled versions, if indeed
they choose acoustic pianos at all.

I hope my amateur predictions are wrong, and that some place will
remain for the charms of mechanical music as we know it, but the
world moves on.  Maybe in the future the nostalgic will be lamenting
for the days when people actually produced their own music at home.

Richard Friedman
Upstate New York