As someone else said on this thread, the reason so few rightpondians have contributed is that the book is hardly known here (I just went to this thread because somebody on another thread pointed me to it).

But from what I remember of it, I can't see how it would be an effective tool for getting new people interested today, anywhere. Its repertoire is so circumscribed and filtered by local and period attitude that it looks a museum exhibit, or one of those retro photos of people in handknitted cardigans and Buddy Holly specs that gets recaptioned as a humorous postcard. You could imagine it being used for a theme night where the food was cubes of cheese and silver onions skewered on toothpicks.

People do bring song binders along to sessions/singarounds in the UK, but no one source predominates. Some people make it work, some don't. I liked this comment:

I will repeat once more my rule: IF you can sing out of a book or from a sheet in such a way that I can't tell with my eyes closed, I will tolerate it! If you almost know the song, but just need a little help to be sure....go ahead! But taking a book and picking a song that you have heard but seldom tried and reading it AT a group seldom works.