I hadn't heard of HDCP until reading this Engadget article. Apparently, the next generation of TVs and monitors will all have copy protection built in to the display, and HD-DVD and Blu-Ray discs may require HDCP-enabled monitors to display full-resolution images.
Basically, what this means is that it'll be even harder to make a few personal copies of media you buy or get off the air, things which are perfectly legal. (And let's not forget the wonderful DMCA laws, which basically say: Once the producer puts in some copy protection, getting around copy protection is illegal in and of itself now, regardless of whether it would've been legal to copy it otherwise. I mean, what the hell?)
What makes me sad is that people are putting up with this these days. I remember when I was a kid, and many software packages had incredibly annoying copy protection. People got so pissed off that the software companies stopped doing it. What happened? Why are things different now? I think people are just more complacent now. Either that, or the media companies have gotten better at their propaganda. (In essence, they use faulty statistics to claim huge losses when the losses are likely small. They also often say they're fighting large scale piracy, when they're really fighting home copying, since professional pirates always find a way around it anyway.)
Thing is, I'm not saying they suffer no losses from copying. That may be true in some cases (like how I buy a lot more music now because I went through an MP3 phase to discover and grow to appreciate music in general), but I'm even willing to grant them that they probably suffer some losses. The issue is that they exaggerate those losses. Whereas before we might have collectively seen consumer rights as outweighing some small losses, they've made many people see consumer rights as being overwhelmed by (imaginary) massive losses.
Sorry for the rant.