Hi James, not really, if you look at the intent of the initial thread starters, there are quite a lot of covers. Certainly far from songwriting. And if one were to look at the replies, they are far from those that one would deem as being related to songwriting. These are my thoughts from a non-scientific view. 8)
You may want to ask around to see if such an idea is worth its own area at Soft. I of course see lots of merits for it, in terms of providing an avenue for songwriters to discuss techniques, concepts, inspiration, equipment etc etc etc - strictly from a songwriting POV. Having such a dedicated area will prompt threads closer to the goal of songwriting.
I found out that a few Scandinavian countries have frequent songwriting workshops, similar to what local story-tellers (books) have. Perhaps Soft can start the ball rolling with a dedicated area - to see the response and to see if something more concrete can be done later.
Cheers
RoRK