the notion of a one size fits all book that everyone sings the same songs from all together, reminds me of 'mass-processed' folk music (rather than the more traditionally processed stuff). And for my own part, I'm thoroughly glad that we don't have it here.

We did, once. The "community singing" movement was huge in the UK before radio became omnipresent, with group singalongs reaching stadium-sized proportions. You must have seen things like the News Chronicle Songbook or the Francis and Day book - archaeological remains of that movement.

And from a much earlier period: broadsides and chapbooks were printed in large enough numbers to be the main source of income for a whole class of people in every large city in the British Isles from the 16th century on. Popular editions of songs by Dibdin and Burns were printed in landfill-choking volume from the middle of the 18th century. People didn't spend their pennies on these for no purpose, they were USED.

There is a very old and very widespread tradition of singing and playing from print, and there is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of in being part of it. The numbers of people doing it must have been MANY times greater than the tiny minority of travellers maintaining a purely oral tradition.