Relative to the time of this post, Does 下星期五 Refer to this coming closest Friday or does it refer to next Friday?

Thanks!

Next Friday. For this Friday I would use 今

It is quite ambiguous, I only know this from own experience, not from any official grammar point of view: if I use it on a Monday, people think more of the coming closest Friday, if I use it on a Thursday, people would expect me to use mingtian, so they might think of next week's Friday. When using, I have often to clarify this: 这个星期五, 下个星期 星期五. I also would be interested to learn about other's experience, I'm often puzzled about this.

Based on experience I second what Roland is saying. There probably is a formal rule, but it's pretty much like people will use it ambiguously in English. Context is important.

I should mention that I am speaking from a cantonese speaker's point of view, although I don't believe it matters in this case. Aside from Mandarin speakers using 这, we use 今 :)

Anywho, back to point...as Roland mentioned, yes, there sometimes is confusion, but whenever you ask for clarification, 下 almost always means next while 今/这 always means this.

I just talked with a Chinese friend (coming from Jiangsu), she told me 下星期五 means next week Friday, if you use it on Sunday, it refers to the next coming Friday, as the week starts on Monday, from Monday onward it refers to next week Friday. The next coming Friday would be 这星期五.
Another experience: I am going a lot by taxi, if I refer to the next traffic light (make a turn etc), I have to use 这, if I use 下, the driver will pass the first traffic light and will make the turn on the second.
Thanks for bringing this up, now it's also clear for me.

I think it's confusing in both languages. FWIW, I teach English on Saturdays. Once I said to a student as he was leaving "See you next Saturday!" He did not show up for class the following week. When I called him to ask why, he said he thought I meant there would be no class in one week, and he should return in two.

Whoops!

Cool, knowing its equally as ambiguous as in english is handy (:

Thanks!

yeah I confuse my conversational partners all the time with this because of the difference between english/dutch and chinese usage.

I think the best is to split it up not as 下 - 星期五，as in next - friday, but as 下星期-五 as in next week - friday. So it is always after the next (following) sunday. So saying it on a monday, it will skip the following friday and go to next week's friday. If you say it after friday but on or before sunday it will mean the following friday.

@sonorier, you got it right. I would just be sure to add the 个／個 to your sentence to get it right.

If you are referring a day of the week (lets stick with Friday) you can also say 周五 and it will be implied that you are talking about the week you are currently in.