Firstly, hard advice though it may be, it is the only sound advice there ever has been when it comes to the cutthroat nature of the industry.

I simply don't accept that the aggrieved musicians shouldn't have been expected to know the terms of the contracts they signed. If they did sod all to protect their own financial interests, why should anyone have sympathy for them? I'm supposing there may even have been a few of them who never read their own contracts before or after signing. Too busy down at the pub with the lads, perhaps?

Secondly, it is common sense to know that business and friendship rarely mix well in any industry. That knowledge was quite well known even at the time those older contracts were signed.

Thirdly, if those musicians had bothered to educate themselves about the industry they were attempting to make a living in, they would have known what could happen to their creative work when their friend turned out to be terrible at business, or the label was gobbled up by another, etc etc. Those circumstances have never been uncommon occurences in the folk music industry, even back in those days.

Finally, there were, obviously, no fewer fools among them then, than there are today.