We all know we can record to wave files and email and ftp them all over the place. This is done every day and collaboration can occur over a vast geography. But, it's not real time.
I predict that a very big thing will be an "audio network" riding over either private networks or the public internet. The recording engineer and his console equipment could be located in Nashville, and the guitarist might be located in California, the bassist in Japan, and the drummer in Sweden, and the vocalist in Georgia.
Through audio routers, they all plug their instruments and/or mics into their audio router, and that router transmits the audio digitally across private/public networks to the recording engineer, who patches them into his console via ordinary ethernet instead of XLR or 1/4" TRS.
He can send each musician a virtual mix emphasizing that musician's track in that musician's headphones, while recording everyone simultaniously through the console to whatever media, analog or digital, that is normally used.
No flights, no emailing of 500mb wave files, no travel costs.
Right in the middle of a recording the bassist in Japan throws a fit, you can unplug him and call another bassist and have him/her plug in - on the fly.
I see tremendous opportunity for both technology manufacturers, recording studios, and musicians who embrace this kind of technology.