Surely, it's not the publication itself which is the problem, it's the tendency for a proportion of the population to regard anything "written down in black and white" as if it was a fundamentalist's Bible.
There is an obsession with the idea of a "correct version" which leads those with such an attitude to cling like limpets to a published version. A key factor in aural tradition is its fluidity, the fact the different versions occur in different areas, in different cultures and subcultures and at different times.
If you look at a published version of a song as holy writ, it has been fossilised as far as you are concerned.
If you look at it and think, "That's good. I could do something with that" then the song is still moving on.
Cheers
Dave