Re: HP GPIB is far from dead.
It's also still used in tons of measurement and test equipment (which after all was the original purpose). Your computer might not have a built-in GPIB interface nowadays, but hook it up to a LAN- or USB-to-GPIB adapter and you're good to go.
One of our customers told us that they preferred GPIB over LAN because when an operator trips over a LAN cable, it will rip the cable out of the socket and stop production. With a GPIB cable, the operator might fall and get a bloody nose, but production will be unaffected.