Whilst recognizing that we couldn't exist without definitions, someone has already posted that the language is evolving all the time, and therefore definitions are also changing all the time, some words, e.g., ballad, going around in circles and from one extreme to another. Whilst institutions nowadays are largely responsible for proposing new meanings (definitions) it's the 'people' who decide/accept/reject these meanings. Lexicographers merely collect these meanings (yes and they perpetuaute them by publishing them). With 'folk' the people have spoken and they obviously like the wider meaning, so no amount of whingeing on these threads is going to make a hapoth of difference to that!!