Guitar video games are not as useful as real guitars.

If you want to play a guitar then you should just play a guitar and focus on that. Since the fingering is completely different between a guitar controller and a real guitar it will teach you bad habits and severely slow your progress if you ever try to actually play guitar.

I am not a policy debater and there is not much to debate here. But thank you for authorship.

First there is not documented proof that those who begin on a guitar, or on a controller have more or less difficulty than the latter. The fact that finger speed itself and repetitive movement trains the fingers to do something so that these muscles can adjust to the strain.

But none the less there is still the argument that hey its not a real guitar, well what about the new technology being created to input a real guitar into the system.

Regardless if you give a child guitar hero, or a auctul guitar, which is he more likely to practice with? Which can he stand and play with his friends for hours on end comparing who has faster fingering. This is a essential skill put forth to learning the guitar itself. If anything a controller guitar inspires and creates more guitarist.

http://gizmodo.com...

For comparing fast fingers, that can be done with a real guitar too. Me and my friends race on neo-classical songs all the time. You could say that the game provides an objective analysis of speed in the points system, but this can also be done with a metronome to track beats per minute, as well as the easily observable, who finishes first?
As the original question relates to productivity, I would also point out that an actual instrument has a more likely potential to make a someone money than a video game.

"For comparing fast fingers, that can be done with a real guitar too. Me and my friends race on neo-classical songs all the time."

Yes but in this sence do you not have to practice in speed as well. In Earnie boles guitar instructional book, are there not pages consisting of techinicues to improve speed over all. As far as proiductivity it also goes as far as to prove controllers fight obeasity and with money you see that there are numerous gaming leauges awarding tens of thousands of dollars to winners of individual and team events. Even bands inspired to play strictly with the guitar controllers. In turn could the guitar even go as far as becoming obselete?

http://www.wisegeek.com...
"This is one of the reasons that with many activities that involve the body's muscles, like playing an instrument, learning appropriate technique is always stressed. You want your muscle memory to reflect the correct way to do things, not the incorrect way. Your muscle memory can actually play against you if you've constantly been practicing something the wrong way.

Music teachers often make this contention. It's a lot harder to teach someone who's been playing an instrument for a few years because the first step is breaking them of all the bad habits they've acquired, which are now part of the muscle memory. Similarly, if you learn to bat, throw, kick or pitch wrong, your muscle memory has to be overcome, and new neural pathways formed to be a better athlete."

As you can see, most music teachers, who we can consider the experts on learning an instrument, would cantend that learning improper fingering will hinder progress later on. Having no seperation for strings, and a very small number of buttons to represent frets, the controller can not possibly teach correct fingering, and can therefore only develop an improper playing habit.

As for potential earnings. There is far more potential to earn money playing a guitar than a video game.

Your argument contends that the most even an elite level video gamer can make is in the thousands. They are also limited solely to tournament play to earn money.

Now elite level guitarists, if commercially successful, can make millions. That is better than thousands. And if not commercially successful, there are other avenue's. A street busker in a large city can make hundreds of dollars per day. That adds up very quickly when they can play almost daily in many climates. There is also the avenue of music instruction. This could be at a privately owned studio, or even a college level proffessorship.
Yet another avenue is that of a session guitarist at a studio. This is just the tip of the icebergh, but should give a small indication of the variety of options available.

As for replacing the guitar, that is not likely. The electric guitar did not replace the acoustic guitar, nor did the keyboard replace the piano.
Keyboards and synthesizer use reached it's high point in the eighties, remained popular in the early nineties, and has declined since then.

The wide variety of digital effects and processing technology today is only increasing the guitars potential and versatility.

To conclude: While there may be a potential for limited productivity of the guitar video games in a tournament setting, it is but a fraction of the returns recieved on dedication to the actual instrument.