I don't think that's quite true. When I first started in the early 1990s, it was pretty expensive to get into as a hobby. I could have been fairly economicall

I don't think that's quite true. When I first started in the early 1990s, it was pretty expensive to get into as a hobby. I could have been fairly economically comfortable in my college years, but was constantly making myself broke by pouring every dollar I could spare into records. The flipside of this was that the people who did take it up tended to be serious about it. From time to time there would be some rich kid who would blow a few grand of daddy's money on gear and music, declare himself a DJ, and then get bored a month later. For the most part, though, the financial burden meant that new arrivals would take it seriously and were interested in improving. As CD decks and CD-Rs became common I thought we'd see a lot of fresh talent from people who wouldn't have been able to afford starting out when I did. Instead there was a flood of people who just wanted to call themselves a "DJ" but had negligible interest in learning much about their music genre or developing any technical skills. Instead of stronger wheat, we got buried in a ton of chaff. The other underappreciated change was to how clubnight promotion works. In the olden days, the promoter would take care of making flyers and getting people in the door. They'd seek out DJs that they thought would keep this crowd happy. So as a newb DJ, if you would work yourself up the ladder by impressing the local promoters and developing a good reputation with them. They would provide the crowds that you'd make your name with. Today, with effectively all promotion being done online the biggest thing that a rookie DJ can bring is a built-in audience. There is a huge advantage to the social butterflies of the world, who can now effectively self-promote their appearances to a wide circle of acquaintances, saving the club promoter work. That might seem like a small shift (or just sound like sour grapes from an old geezer), but it has been a striking difference in who gets started. For a long time a lot of DJs fit a certain archetype of music nerds.. often the most introverted people at the nightclub. Once when I met rookie DJs I felt like I saw a younger version of myself in them. Now I don't get that feeling... it's just a different set of people who take it up. It's certainly possible that there could be a renaissance. The technology available today lets DJs do live manipulation that the best turntabilists a generation ago couldn't have dreamt of. However, I'm not optimistic -- I think that realistically 95% of the people showing up simply don't care about what part of the process is being done live. I think increasingly clubs are just going to move to playing livestreams or pre-recorded sets and avoid the cost of an onsite DJ entirely. As long as people still show up and buy alcohol that works fine for them. I think ultimately the notion of a nightclub paying someone to haul in music, select what to play, and mix it live will be an anachronism.