Like you said, WTS is more like X. It uses a whole different protocol. And in many ways is much better then X. It is faster, allows for sound etc...
But back to TTY's. The TTY concept was well thought out in my opinion. Much like the unix file system where everything is a device. All TTY devices have a "common interface". this allows you to do such things as hook a modem up to a serial port. Make a minor adjustment in a config file or two and presto - the serial port just became a dial in/out server. The login process and all the programs do not care. As far as they know you are sitting at the console.
But I digress. Today there is rarely a need for such things. And realistically, for my OS - and for most people on this board, it is safe to assume there is a console and really no need to support TTYs. Afterall that opens up a whole new can of worms once you want to do something like really support a VT100. Unix patched things up with libtermcap and curses. I'm not sure I want to go there.
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