It might be more rare but it's not dead - sampling innovators like madlib, rjd2 and flying lotus sample all kinds of crazy stuff and I think most true diggers who have been doing it for a while will.
I'm still figuring my music out and it has other influences besides hiphop, but I sample all kinds of stuff - new age, pop, electronic, whatever. I think it's partly what you connect with and what you grew up with - if you grew up with soul and really connect to it, it makes sense to sample it a lot even if a lot of other people have. I like it but I like a lot of other stuff too.
I think I get caught up with how my music relates to what other people are doing and that can be a good thing but right now I'm striving to just make my music - sample what I want to sample - and not get too hung up on what other people are doing.
It is fun finding something someone sampled though - a lot of times it's just a loop that I thought they had chopped up or played. But you can turn a played out sample into something totally different. I don't see many people doing much innovating on most of these forums - mostly just immitating, not that I don't or that it doesn't have its place, just saying. Interesting thread topic.
true about the 16 levels - I do it a lot though to get my own melodies - that's why I moved from mpcs to ensoniqs cause they're way more geared towards that. I don't know how many people pitch samples on keys - it's fun though.