Once again it's a discussion of three different things.

1. FOLK. Traditional music, from any tradition, as defined by the whole 1954 shebang or something similar, which may or may not be dead and which you may or may not hear in some folk clubs. Subject to academic study and discussion. The style and content, or whether individual songs and tunes are actually any good, is irrelevant. What matters is the provenance. This can be played by gathering of amateurs, professional musicians or anyone else who fancies it and can range in style from unaccompanied singing to fuzzed out garage rock, so long as the songs are from the traditional repertoire.

2. FOLK. Anything labelled as such by the music industry, whether specialist or generalist. This is probably what the general public thinks is folk, if any of them actually have an opinion on the matter. All the professional performers (and many of those who aspire to be) are included in this category - if it's about paying at the door and bums on seats, it doesn't matter if its trad or folktronica or singer songwriting or protest songs, it's all industry folk because on some level it's a commercial enterprise, whether successful as such or not.

3. FOLK. Music of the people in the sense of amateur musicians of any age or ability or background coming together publically or privately to play any music in any genre on any instrument for the sheer pleasure of playing - without any commercial or industrial considerations. This can be traditional music, cover versions, new songs, opera arias or what ever else floats the boat of the participants - the essential thing is that it's homemade and no money changes hands. This may happen inside or outside of gatherings labelled folk clubs.

*****************************************************************

There's nothing wrong with any of these definitions. None of them are right or wrong - and on their own terms and all of them do exactly what is said on the tin. There's even areas of overlap between them, except, arguably, between No.2 and No.3 (though professional musicians turning up for a No.3 event, on the terms of No.3, would for that moment be playing No.3 folk, of course). They already co-exist and in true popping-the-genie-back-in-the-bottle mode, no-one is in a position to claim the term 'folk' as an exclusive definition to describe one and not the others. What anyone might want - or how things 'should' be - is irrelevant. This is what we have. And as far as I can see, it's fine, if we work on the basis that playing and listening to music is something people do for pleasure.

I'd also add that if I fancy going to see a film, for instance, I won't just turn up knowing nothing about it, I'll read a review first to see if it's the sort of thing I might enjoy. It's the same with a 'folk' night - we are not in a position to simply turn up and expect it's going to be the version of folk we might favour: we have to do a little research. Just as we would with many things in life.