Bit, true that.  And I like live music.  And professional recording etc. (ie. selling a product) has become more technique than innovative talent.  The best new idea pop (and by pop I mean popular music in all the genres) was the Cher voice effect.  Otherwise, I have a hard time coming up with anything new on the radio in the last 10 years.
 
What is funny is the pendulum usually comes crashing back.  At some point an untrained 15-20 year old is going pick up a guitar, learn 3 chords and come up with a straight rock song that sells millions, instigating the next "garage/punk/grunge" scene, much like rock was an answer to pop in the 50s, bubblegum in the 60s, pop in the 70s and 90s.  We are due.  Unless the emotional part of the recording process has been totally neutered in the studio, allowing perfection to kill the possible.
 
As Lennon said about "I saw her again" by the Momas and Papas when John came in early on the chorus and they kept it, contrary to all "rules of recording", 'Pure genius."
 
@

Well thank you everybody. I had no idea that my original question could prompt such a rich response. All though much of it is way over my head, it is never the less most informative and I'm sure that I have learnt something.

Again, this really comes down to personal preference. Unless working with a seriously resource-strapped machine, it is 6 one way, half a dozen to the other. Clips do add a nice dynamic for editing and visual clarity, but in the grand scheme of things is no biggie as long as it plays properly.

AT
As Lennon said about "I saw her again" by the Momas and Papas when John came in early on the chorus and they kept it, contrary to all "rules of recording", 'Pure genius."

I've just returned from watching The Wrecking Crew, which is playing in Seattle as part of the Seattle Film Festival.
 
One of the many anecdotes was from Herb Alpert regarding the bass drum break in Spanish Flea. He'd put it in as a cue, because the session players were having a hard time coming in together after a break. The four kick drum beats were meant to be a count-in that would be removed before the final mix. An unnamed engineer suggested they keep it in, and it is the most memorable moment in the song.
 
"Happy accidents", somebody called those instances of musical serendipity.
 
Another thing that came across in the film is that most of those hits were recorded with at least 4, and usually 8 or 10 people in the room, playing together. And they played the whole song beginning to end. It was because they'd been playing together for so long (and that they were all monster players) that the recordings had a toe-tapping consistency that wormed its way into your ear. You can't get that anymore, not with the fragmented Lego-style assembly methods in use today.
 

mettelus
I just tested remove silence and it does not perform a bounce, so the file size is unchanged. Simple test to prove to yourself:

1.  Create a project, insert the same discrete audio clip from the media browser (I grabbed an 8 bar loop and inserted it once at bar 3, then again at bar 30 - clip used was "DMS CPC PT2 05 E MINOR CHORDS 138 BPM.wav").
2. Check the audio folder, two discrete clips (these are identical, both 2401KB).
3. Select both clips and bounce to new clip (creates one file, size 24.122MB).
4. Save As (checking "copy all audio with project", and the 24.122MB file moves).
5. Run Remove Silence (I used default settings), clip size changes, but no bounce occurs (audio is still 24.122MB).
6. Save As (but this time check "copy all audio with project" and "Create one file per clip").
7. This save as renders new audio files (one per clip) (clip 1 = 6387KB (due to the silent tail), clip 2 = 5517KB (as at the end of the track so has no tail).

Again, "Remove Silence" unto itself does nothing to the underlying audio (no bounce occurs). What does change file size is the "Create one file per clip" in the save as dialog (render does occur for this).
 
Just to be clear on the original point for folks this is confusing - a "clip" is a window into an underlying wav file (what you are telling the DAW to use). Manipulating this window does not change the underlying file unless it is bounced/rendered, which is a "destructive edit" (the clip will no longer have access to the original file). "Destructive edit" in this case does not actually delete the original file (it is still in the audio folder), but does assign the clip (window) to a different file.

Great experiment mettelus.
 
You do fo course still have access to the original file because you still have the project it resided in before the "save as" was performed.
 
This is probably a more elegant solution visually than using automated mute (or volume) envelopes though I sometimes prefer automating volume to bring the tail of something down gently, rather than abruptly.
 
Mucho food for thought here, and the potential for saving loads of disc space.