Has live sound got any better over the years, sound systems are supposedly getting better and better but lots of shows still have poor sound. I know the easy answer is bad bands and rubbish engineers but is that it?

How things used to be

How they are now

This is how they are now

These are the same in principle to the Vdosc above except that they didn't bang on about dispersion charecteristics

that's what The Beatles did Shea Stadium with innit?
But seriously, I think that for the actual sound to catch up with the potential for greatly improved sound, then people may need to adhere to one basic principle; don't be too loud on-stage. The majority of Backline Amps are designed to work a whole room on their own, not to be reinforced w/ f.o.h. or monitors, but it's not very Rock n Roll turning up at a gig w/ a 1U pre-amp as opposed to 16 AC30s (Brian May) or 5 Ampegs (Bootsy Collins). Also, from a guitarists' p.o.v. the Amp set to 11 is part of the sound (ala Hendrix) so I think that the advances made by P.A companies could have been held back by huge guitar amps in multiples. (GET A POWER SOAK, SAVE YOUR EARS AND SOUND BETTER!?)