Does this give you some new magic DVD's or something. They usually release movies in the U.S. first don't they?

I can see the point in "hacking" Macrovision, but not region codes. Can anyone shed some light on this "holy grail" option?

Am I missing something?

They don't release everything in the US. One example is the classic Disney movie "Song of the South". It was released in Japan, but never in the US (allegedly for racial sensitivity reasons).

Yes, there are several films that have only been released in Europe or Asia. Though you will find the region hack industry is mostly "overseas". Macrovision, however, is universal.

There are a lot of titles (think of them as imports) that are available from Japan that aren't region 1. For this reason it would make sense to made your DVD player 'code-free'.

We live in Silicon Valley, and there are many Chinese tape and LD rental places (all NTSC, BTW!); my wife is Chinese, and every once in a while we rent one - they often have English subtitles. Nobody we've asked is either renting Chinese DVDs as yet, or even aware of the region issues, but as we are talking about 3 major movie producing areas here - Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China (which has its own region number) - that are often at odds with each other, so almost anything could happen in the future, particularly in China, where the government is so heavily involved. Right now, it looks like the stuff that is coming out of the mainland is not giving any problems, but who knows what the future could bring, given the political situation.

I have some friends who regularly receive French and German movies from friends in those countries and play them on multi-standard VCRs and monitors. And while I haven't asked any Indian friends, I know that India has a huge movie business, and who knows what they will choose to do? So, for anyone wanting to watch movies originating outside Region 1, there is a pretty good reason for wanting to be able to get around the region system.

In San Jose, the school system has kids who speak over 70 different languages at home, I once read. The busses have official signs in English, Spanish, and Vietnamese. Most of the cab drivers are Indian or Packistani, and there is a large Russian population. We are, thank god, still a nation of immigrants, and many of them come from countries with lively film industries.

WOW What a mouth full !!

Well I was gonna add that U lot from the U.S.A. Cant get Steve Hackett in Concert cos i have sent the Region 2 Version out to 4 people now !!!
I never even heard of him !!