well, PoppaGator...the exact nature of the "folk process" may have changed with the introduction of recording, and now of the WWW and modern commercial aspects, but I repeat what I said above, and tried to say 20-30 times in the last 8 years.....
   "...those categories can't change everyday or be totally subjective. Songs can gradually gain status as part of a category over time, but the basic definition has to be reasonably stable."

the process may change, but 'folk' or 'trad' must have some general understood meaning, just as 'antique' does and 'endangered species' does, or it will mean nothing...like current teen slang, which is outmoded and a moving target for those trying to study it.

If it doesn't FIT the generally understood category, find a new word or category! Don't just say, "oh, we'll expand it a bit more..after all, we're all 'folks'." If almost everything is folk, why USE the word?