"everybody, it seems, who has done more than 2 or 3 gigs has a CD out, and this has a fatigue effect on the audience and is really detrimental to professionals" By the time Mary and I had done 2 or 3 gigs, people were asking if we had a CD, which was one of the motivations behind our making the first (home-made) album.
That sort of CD (home reorded, burnt to CDR in small numbers) doesn't sell for £12-15, usually more like £5-10.
The problem with pressed CD prices for folk music is one of sales volume. The cost of making an album in the studio and getting a pressing run of 500 CDs is typically £2000-3000. The cost of re-pressing the next 500 is about £500, but you're doing reasonably well if you even get that get that far. A commercial CD that sells tens of thousands is far cheaper per copy to produce, hence popular classics for a fiver in the shops.
So blog away ye bloggers all - God knows you might be the life of this music yet. ... but the death of the people who created it? Samples and bootlegs from live concerts are all very well, but does the blogger include contact details and a link to the artist's web site, and information on where proper recordings can be bought? Clearly in the incident that started this thread the singer/songwriter was treated as a free-to-give-away commodity, not as a living person who deserved some respect.
All this talk of the generosity of source singers and the commercial benefits has nothing to do with bloggers who throw other people's property to the public. It's easy to be generous with someone else's money.
It's as if someone stole my credit card details and used it to make a donation to a (really worthy, of course) charity. What a fine and public spirited gesture...
Oh, and Jim Caroll: once again, of course singers like others to take up their songs, but we're not talking about the songs themselves here, but about recordings which are made as a purely business venture by people who happen to be singers. The baker may be happy to give away his cake recipes, but that is not the same as allowing the public to steal the produce from his shop.