Does this make all lenses "identical"? No, but it does, IMO, make the differences between base line, low cost lenses and their far more costly cousins far less important to the average photographer than in the days of analog equipment.
At the risk of hijacking this thread, while I will EASILY admit that lens manufacturing has come a long way in recent decades...better computer aided designs, better manufacturing techniques, much higher quality control standards, etc., over-all I think I have to disagree with this sentiment.
I think the truth of the matter is that throughout the 60's, 70's and 80's (and even earlier really), there was always a division in the masses regarding quality. For example, your comment says "
Today's smart phones turn out images that are often deemed "great" by the average consumer", however was this not also true of the days when people used Polaroids, Kodak Instamatics and wow...even those old Kodak "disk" cameras? Likewise, compare 35mm to medium format...do we STILL not see this today in the difference between DSLR and say, a Phase One medium format digital back? Even in terms of 35mm alone, A LOT of people used to use 3rd party lenses...Tamron and Sigma have both been around for a long while, not to mention brands like K-Mart's "Focal" and other department store brands (Sears, Montgomery Wards, etc). A great many people used such brands back in the day and were just as happy as the "average photographer" is with such brands today.
Even in terms of processing, while the way we work has changed, having grown up doing dark room work in my earliest days, I can honestly say that what we do today in Photoshop...not really THAT different at all. Photoshop is easier, faster and less messy...no more squinting for endless hours under that red light bulb...but many of the processes are still the same. Burning, dodging, cropping, exposure/contrast adjustment, image retouching...ALL have long been excepted post processing practices. And for those who simply took their rolls of film into FotoMat (or other such labs), there was ALWAYS a degree of processing and corrections that took place...automatic exposure and contrast adjustments and such have been around a loooooooong time.
I also have to feel your comment left out one VERY important aspect regarding all of this;
the photographer. Whether we're talking 35mm, DSLR, Polaroid, camera phone, Instamatic or even a Kodak "Brownie", it's the photographer who takes great images. As history has proven time and time again, it's just NOT about "the gear". You can have the most expensive body on the planet and a foot locker full of high dollar primes, but if you don't understand basic principles and concepts such as composition, the rest just doesn't matter at all. A
good photographer on the other hand, can use very humble equipment and still create truly amazing images.
Likewise you said "
It also tends to homogenize all equipment into an acceptable middle ground of not terrible but also not great performance"...again this is nothing new (or old) at all. For example, that $50 mp3 player you mention...while digital audio is certainly something of an improvement over the days of vinyl and 8-tracks, there's a reason why brands like Bose and Nakamichi cost considerably more than your average I-Pod player and why there are even brands out there that are even more expensive still (check out HigherFi's "Titan 2's" - $510,000!!!)...just as it was 40 years ago. That said, just as with 40 years ago,
not everyone has a specific need to be a true audiophile...I won't speak for others, but I certainly have some very fond memories of the old 8-track player in my '73 Ford Galaxy! LOL!!! Photography or audio, you've always had high end equipment, low end and that ever abundant middle ground...seriously...you don't get too much more "homogenized" than Realistic! LOL!
Now there is one thing that HAS changed over the last 40 years or so...the internet. I think this could be the crux of the matter regarding our perception of amateur photography efforts today. Ok...I hate to admit it, but yea...I'm starting to get old. Thinking back to the 1970's, let's face it...unless you were a genuine professional, the only people who really got to see your work (as an amateur) were usually friends & family...maybe a few people at a local photography club or something. Seriously...how many of us shot countless rolls of film that would ultimately end up in the proverbial shoe box? Yea...sure...maybe you did an occasional enlargement of something "special"...a certain vacation or wedding picture or something, but even there, how many people
really got see your work? Does that mean all such work was simply horrible? Hardly. I don't have any statistics to back this up, but I suspect there were A LOT of really great photographers back in the 60's, 70's and 80's (even before) who may have shot some truly INCREDIBLE images, who have simply gone as unsung heroes because those image have long since rotted away in the shoe box sitting in the back of the closet.
I guess there's probably something of a stereotype here that makes it easy for some people to think that photos from those decades were always just terrible unless taken by a pro. I suspect that many of us older folks today have some frightening memories of the slideshows "Uncle Bob" used to torture us with for hours on end - "This is Aunt Jane at Disneyland...this is Aunt Jane with Micky Mouse...this is Aunt Jane spilling her beer on Micky Mouse...that was my thumb in front of Micky Mouse as Aunt Jane was hugging him...". Yikes, I say...YIKES!!! That said however, I can look back through some old family photo albums...my family's trip to Hawaii back in '78 for example...and even though Dad was a
LOUSY photographer, yea...there's actually some good, if not really great images in those albums. Certainly comparable to what people might shoot with camera phones these days.
So what's the difference? The internet. Again, back in the day few people outside of family and friends would get to see those vacation pictures. Today however, it just take a few mouse clicks to post those shots to Facebook, Pinterest or any number of (gasp) photo forums. In the 70's and 80's, my pictures may have been seen by maybe 10 or 20 people...today hundreds, if not thousands of people from all over the world can view a given person's work, amateur or pro alike. That said, I don't think that means that the work of your "avid enthusiasts" has really improved
THAT much in the past 50 years...average photographers and enthusiasts have been around a LONG time. It simply means we get to see more....A LOT MORE of it today than we ever have before.
While I do understand the point you have tried to make, I think you have put an over-emphasis on the wrong issue. Are cameras & lenses today better, with the quality more consistent than they were 40 years ago? Sure...just as the technology of the 70's was better than what was available 40 years before that. Technology evolves...from the consumer side of the issue, I do believe that's a good thing. That said, I also have to believe that the distinction in quality between budget/entry level, mid range equipment and pro/high end gear is still quite significant to say the least, however I equally have to STRONGLY feel that's totally independent of the skills of the person using it.
My apologies to the OP for having hijacked the thread, but I truly felt compelled to throw my own $.02 worth in there.