"So, no opinions on the songs with known composers on the Harry Smith Anthology?"
I gave you my response along with an example of one of them with 'known' composers (albeit disputed) and an acknowledgement that such songs could have become folk songs - as the '54 definition pointed out.
That has nothing to do with the fact that today's composed songs are not being taken up and absorbed into the community in the way songs like 'Wreck of the Old 97' were.
I'm happy to describe the 'Smith' songs as folk, and would be over the moon if new songs were being absorbed in the same way.
Thence the difference
Jim Carroll