Are Disc Players Dead?

Commercially they are dead. More or less. Based on the huge amount of available CD's most Audiophiles will stay with their units but the younger generation will go to downstream (or already does). It was not possible to keep the quality of music as a Standard, now it is reduced to Entertainment. No one cares about quality (this started in the mid 90's based on cost reduction...) And high quality downstream is a nice marketing gag, but it is just another tool to earn some money.
In a few years the only real High End will be analog, not because of the quality, more or less based on visual movement. The Audiophile has something to touch, he sees something moving, the turntables can be ultra expensive and he can show his visitors that he is a serious guy. The rest of the world uses a server.

Many interesting and thought provoking comments here. I tend to agree with Nglazer here. I just don't have confidence in what's available today and worry that it might be obsolete in the near future. When large ss hard drives become more affordable, when formats become more standardized and easily backwards compatible, and reliability is proven, I'll jump in.
One thing that nobody seemed to mention is that if one wants to move their disc storage to either a server or a cloud, you'll still need a disc player to do it.

It took me a lifetime to accumulate all of my vinyl, and many years to accumulate the CD's. I'm getting up there in age, and I'm not about to start monkeying around, trial and error, trying to find the best way to use a computer for listening pleasure. It will take me forever to download all of that music, and I don't have the time. It may be the way of the future, and the top of the digital mountain, but I'll stick around down the the lowlands with my antiquated discs. The music is excellent enough for me where I don't need to make such a time consuming change to get a little bit better sound. If I were younger, yeah, I'd be there.

I echo your thoughts Abuck.

Abucktwoeighty, It is not time consuming at all. Instead of putting CD int CDP insert it into computer and play while you rip. Do only disk that you listen to and eventually you'll go thru all of them.