Phillips has a new product that they advertise on TV all the time. It is called a DVD Recorder. From what I can ascertain you can make DVDs from VHS tapes. What is to stop anyone from copying a DVD onto a tape then using this machine to re-reord it onto a DVD blank?
One of the things that the recording industry doesn't like in the new digital age, is that the "bootleg" recordings that are made are "perfect". That is, unlike analog recording methods, you don't lose a bit of the recording quality.
If you go DVD -> VHS -> DVD, there will be such a loss, occurring at both arrows.
Macrovision
It fuzzes up the output in such a way that displaying it doesn't change the signal, but attempting to record it produces a nearly unwatchable signal.
Unless you buy a hacked DVD player that has Macrovision turned off. Mine has this hack and also has the region coding turned off.