The rather HUGE benefit of keeping the lyrics separate is that we can then distribute them amonst ourselves without having to trade massive mp3 files or reload our players -- that just ain't gonna happen for more than a few of us.

And for those of us who also use portable solid-state mp3 players, we don't want our tiny storage capacities further dwindled by lyrics, album covers, band bios, website links, artist profiles, and all of that other crap that is being tagged onto our "music" files.

id3v2: just say no, thanks.