There's a whole section near the end of the article about a noticeable bump in sales of guitars to women, inspired by Taylor Swift. You just have to be more flexible about what "guitar hero" can mean.
I think even the most flexible definition of guitar hero shouldn't include Taylor Swift. I'd say that style of guitar - using it for texture under the song - is antithetical to guitar heroism. The guitar became heroic because it broke out of the background music section of the band that supports the singer and became a star in its own right. It was another avenue of expression just by itself. Strumming some chords on an acoustic guitar as part of a song where the focus is the story of the lyrics doesn't require a guitar. It could be swapped with a keyboard, or a mandolin or a piano and it wouldn't really change the song that much.
There are other approaches to the guitar that are just as historically significant as the Hendrix-style electric solo. Not long before that, in the folk music boom, the acoustic guitar was seen as the ultimate democratic instrument -- you could toss it in the back of your car, drive to a gig or a party, and start playing immediately (rhythm, harmony, melody, whatever you like).
And music is really just a the electrical impulses from bunch of soundwaves banging up against the membrane in our eardrums. Jeez, that kind of reductionism really kills the magic (not to mention ignoring the talent and feel involved for an artist to make those oscillators 'speak' to you)
