Why ​摺 in Simplified Texts and not 折?

Question

I've seen ​摺 (almost intentionally I would assume) written in numerous simplified texts, especially with the word ​摺叠​.

Here's one example (emphasis is my own):

浙江在线 《以“色”诱人 专属定制》

浙江在线·住在杭州网3月3日消息 一方飘逸的丝巾，摺叠间营造出许多迥异的情调，变幻出万种风情。不同颜色、不同戴法，搭配出多少不同的你，或端庄秀丽、或热情奔放、或甜美娇人，让你摇曳生姿，变的生动而魅力。

Grand Ricci seems to like this simplification too, it contains an entry for ​摺叠​ but none for 折叠.

Guifan has the following footnote:

注意 “摺”简化为“折”, 但在“摺”和“折”意义可能混淆时, 《简化字总表》规定仍用“摺”。

Which doesn't totally clear things up, really.

• What reason would 摺 be used in simplified texts as opposed to 折?

• Is this a regional variant? (i.e.: TW/HK vs. Mainland, etc.)

• Where would 折 and 摺 have different meanings? (Like mentioned in Guifan?)

Answer 1

折 is not a simplified character. 摺 just happens to be a rarer character that means the same thing, namely to fold (v), or folder (n).

折 is here much more versatile, and has additional connotations, such as break, lose, die, act, and so on.

Here we have words such as 打摺 (fold), which is obviously not the same as 打折 (make a discount).

Answer 2

In Cantonese sense, 折 and 摺 are completely different words with different pronunciation. 折 (tsit8) means "split" and "break" while 摺 (tsip8 or tsap8) means "fold". They are not interchangeable. In the evolution of Mandarin they converge to sound zhé finally, and people get confused.

Answer 3

I had the impression that both 折 / 摺 mean "to fold", but 折 means "to fold only once", while 摺 only means "to fold only more then once". i.e. one-fold vs multi-fold. (In both verbal and noun context)

I don't think that they are simplified/traditional variants to each other -- but I have less knowledge in this part.

Answer 4

According to the dictionary in my phone, 折 have two meanings. One is pronounced Zhe2, which means to break or fold something, this is same as 摺. The another one is pronounced she2 means having been broken, which is not the same as 摺.

And there is a note saying that when there might be confusion use 摺 according to the simplified Chinese character chart even though it has been simplified as 折.

Buy the way, it seems 摺 can only be pronounced as zhe2