Howard Jones wrote: This raises questions why such a vulnerable situation was allowed in the first place....

From this I conclude that you've never been deeply involved in a long-established, low-budget, non-profit, largely-volunteer-driven organization. :-)

I have. A lot of them. In groups like that, what usually happens is that they identify a need and ask if someone can do it. "We need some posters." "Sure, I'll slap someone together." "We need someone to go talk to such-and-such folk club." "Sounds like fun." "We need a web site." "OK, I'd like to give it a try."

And then the job gets bigger and bigger, until it's really too much for one person. It's a lot harder to manage a web site with a whole bunch of databases and such than one that just says, "Hi! We're a music site. You can e-mail us at...." :-)

If you want another example, look at all the difficulties in keeping mudcat running!

And people get old, too. The number of great projects that die just because the dedicated volunteer who ran it becomes disabled is... astronomical. I know it's coming for the Ballad Index. I looked for many years for a successor. But it takes a peculiar sort of person to do the job. No one is interested, and very few have the required skills anyway. With luck, when I have to give it up, we'll have a home for it that will endure. But there will be no updates after that.

Be glad VWML is at least taking the task seriously, even if there are enough teething pains to suggest they need oral surgery....