Ok Let's try some new definitions:

For CD covers, live credits at gigs etc. how about:

'Maker's Name" = in copyright (at the time), royalties due.

"Makers Name; OC" = out of copyright, free to use, but maker respected. (This is where I part company with Rathingle. Just because a work's out of copyright and therefore now 'traditional' it doesn't mean we can forget to credit the maker. If that happened we'd have forgotten about a man called O'Carolan, for example)

"Collected, c (collector's name if possible)" = out of copyright, but traceable to what some used to call 'The Tradition," (though it should have been called "A Tradition") before the term became obsolete.

"Arr Name; any of the above" = registered for copyright but only that precise version, plus the arranger/producer must show that he or she has done his or her best to at least alert the maker, the maker's estate, or the collector before publishing.

"Anon" = genuinely untraceable and so widely used as not to belong to any definable 'tradition.' Therefore no copyright / ownership possible.

That should sort the ownership issue - but it's not ideal for describing the 'folk process.'

I'd suggest that instead of saying The Tradition (a phrase I hate because people use it like a mantra, as an excuse not to think, as a means of gaining acceptence), people should take the trouble to identify which strain they mean.

E.g. The English Rural Tradition, The Donegal Fiddle Tradition, the Sea Chanty Tradition, Football Terrace Tradition, School Playground Tradition, 60s Songwriter Tradition - etc etc etc, and then just not bother to use the T word at all!

It's too late to rescue the word 'folk' - it has too broad a meaning to be redfined now, but if we just learned to use the words 'made,' 'collected' or 'anon' instead of the dreadful 'trad' I'd be content.