hmm! I generally am not *against﹡this idea. I like the notion of giving “programmed” its own “tree” of “instruments”, then we could include in it; synthesisers, computers, trackers, gizmos, other vocoders, etc.
It would solve both https://tickets.metabrainz.org/browse/INST-589 and the problem inherent with https://tickets.metabrainz.org/browse/INST-258 (see the comments)
Sadly it, and any extended “gears” type such is also dependant (at-least in part) by https://tickets.metabrainz.org/browse/STYLE-609
My idea is to have one tree, but each instrument can have any or all of 4 attributes (ticket box): “instrument”, “vocal”, “gear” and this: “programmable”. Then, in the edit-relationship search for attaching vocals/instruments etc, to the “artist performed [instrument]” relation, the instrument would only show up at the appropriate places:
say “Electric guitar” has “instrument”, it wouldn’t show up in the “vocal” relationship search, but vocoder would have “vocal” and “programmable” and thus would show up in both, “Computer” would only have “programmable” but “soprano” would only have vocal, various synths would have “instrument” and “programmable” while a dampener could probably have “programmable” and “gear”… and so on.