If you insist on constraining the generic term of modeling to one method (component modeling),
then yeah. Profiling is not component modeling. Christoph said he was lazy and wanted an automated way to do it. That’s obvious.
Allow the term to be even slightly generic to permit other methodologies or ways to get a similar result - and you get Captures or Profiles or whatever marketing term isn’t taken.
They imitate, emulate, mimic, copy, replicate…..whatever. They all *model* the sound of an amplifier.
It’d be like saying a 3D printed plastic car isn’t a model because it wasn’t injection molded. Or made from wood or metal or whatever.
Modeling has always (to me) meant attempting to model with digital processing what the circuit was doing in the tube amp (including the tube).
Profiling and capturing have always (to me) meant comparing the input and output of an actual amp and using it to recreate its behavior (not modeling and two different approaches)
Both are digital simulations or emulators of a real amp.
It is still irrelevant as the ToneX, as nearly perfect of a capture device as it is, still does not have the workflow, or additional overall processing and efx needed to sound as good as the Player.