Pioneer (and Sony too) makes some of the best DVD burners, and they also make great standalone players. I'm sure they were part of the consortium that decided upon the DVD-Video standards, such as the copy protection. The newer DVD's have implemented better, though still defeatable, copy protection. Now that the secret of just how easy it is to copy these things is out, and everybody and his brother has purchased a Pioneer DVD burner and Pioneer standalone and probably hundreds if not thousands of blanks, they are starting to lose profits from DVD movie sales. What came upon the scene soon after dual layer discs (which allowed you to fit the whole movie on one disc with no compression) started to become more affordable and commonplace? Blu-Ray and HD-DVD to the rescue!!! Yaaayyyy!!!! high def picture and sound!!! OMG HD!!! Sure people will still copy their friends' older DVDs, but for new releases/reissues a lot of people will want hi-definition. Classic and revered movies, especially. Who is going to want to watch a standard definition DVD copy of Star Wars or Raging Bull on their brand new 42" 1080p Samsung? Blu-Ray and HD-DVD have watermarking and very strong protection from what I hear. I'm not trying to be a jerk, just illustrating a point.