I agree that calling a machine built wheel a hand built is a lie, even if it's finished (touched up) by hand. I'm just not sure if it's material to the quality to the finished product. Even machine built wheels start out hand built, since only the very largest factories use a machine to load spokes into a hub. Also all machine built wheels are laced by a human working with a machine who's sole contribution is attaching nipples as spokes are brought to the rim.

So the only places where there's a clear difference between man and machine is in the tensioning, and final operations. Consumers benefi from machine built wheels by virtue of the cost savings passed on. The problem isn't whether machines are used, but the quality control, and unfortunately that's hard to know from just looking.

I think there'll always be a place for truly hand built wheels, whether it's because of the "hand built" ethic, because it allows the freedom of user selected components, or because it allows reuse of quality hubs. But buyers should be aware that most bike shops do not build 90% of the wheels they sell, so odds are that the bike shop wheel was bought from a production facility. Hopefully, shops go through enough wheels that they can judge the quality control of the various producers, and stick to ones they've come to trust.