Cap'n,
The idea that there is a 'right and wrong' person to receive information - of any kind - is disturbing, to say the least.
Who is to be the judge - you - me George Bush; come on Cap'n, you can do better than raise a silly statement made forty five years ago.
This smacks of the mysterious 'big league' which first came to light in a Musical Traditions review some years ago, presumably a self-appointed elite who decides what is good-bad or right-wrong on behalf of the rest of us.
As far as print is concerned, I have never met a source singer who was not influenced in one way or another by print. The Irish song repertoire would be very much impoverished without the existence of the garlands and song books that could be bought at the fairs and markets up to the first half of the 20th century, or the ballad sheets that were sold on the streets and in the pubs, or even the still ongoing song page in Ireland's Own.
Putting songs in a book does preserve them, but not like stuffed animals.
The future of published songs lays entirely in the hands of the people who get hold of the books.
Jim Carroll