Laoise- I am pleasantly surprised at getting a reasoned response to my passionate arm waving! As a matter of fact, I would be VERY happy if such a system as you describe was widely used.I really do not care what music people like and sing-and I actually LIKE a wider variety than it must sound like in my posts (although traditional folk IS my favorite)-I just hate having it all lumped together when I am in the mood for *TRAD*.

I do disagree, however, that it is necessary to mis-label Dylan and Susanne Vega, etc., in order to trick the kids into listening to the rest. I feel that those who have the right attitudes to appreciate traditional folk will find their way...it will probably never be main-stream anyway. Even during the 60's folk boom, not too many traditional folk singers made much money...it was the Kingstion Trio types..(the popularizers and 'arrangers') who got the recognition.

Whippoorwill--you are correct, people will tend to disagree on definitions...and 'folk' is one of the trickiest....but I repeat: There are many threads being started that have NO resemblance to ANY definition of folk! I will gladly shrug at the borderline cases- even up to tolerating Bob Dylan (thought I do have to swallow hard) but not pure rock & roll, movie musicals, and totally commercial singer-songwriters! When I see these, I wonder what the poster thought the title "a magazine dedicated to blues and folk music" meant! Or what DigiTrad meant! Did you ever watch someone park in a space labeled 'handicapped' and explain to anyone who complained "Oh, I just needed to run in here for just a minute."...That is what is happening--people are starting posts with "oh, I know this isn't really folk, but I just wonder if...." I really wish that even those who KNOW the answer would politely send them elsewhere. I also wish that there were similar forums available for pop, rock, musicals...etc. Except that THOSE are the areas that would REALLY have problems with copyright lawyers! I also wish more people would learn to use the nice search engines in Yahoo, Infoseek, Alta Vista etc. They just might find their lyrics in 2 hours rather than 2 days.

Enough--I think I'll go play some music. Ewan McColl perhaps!