I have read the previous posts on this topic and as a 44-year-old
I have always admired these items.  I have a player piano, player
organ, disc music box, grandfather clocks, cuckoo clocks, et cetera.
I am a nut for these items, but there are a couple of problems.
One of them is that the people who would truly enjoy the items have
been pushed out by the pricing of people who have turned these items
into investment only.

The folks who would love to have an item and treasure it for its
historical significance can no longer afford one, and the prices
for repairs on these items are very much a part of why folks are not
interested.  These items are expensive and, when anything goes wrong,
if you can find someone to work on them they don't want to fix the
problem -- they want to do a full restoration or they won't work
on them.

No doubt technology plays a rolls in things, but the economy is the
major factor: antiques have always been admired and desired but the
pricing and people making less is, I believe, the biggest contributor
to the loss in interest.  Most people nowadays are doing well to save
enough to buy one of these items, just to get them and discover they
need some kind of repair that is not in their budget.

As long as the economy continues to be out of control and cost of
repairs continue to rise, the problem is only going to grow.

Don Freeman