Originally posted by: Karyudo
I don't think that's true. I think what has happened is that there are an awful lot of works that are basically worthless (commercially), and those original copyright holders end up selling for a song the rights to stick those films on DVD.

There may be some that are licenced out cheaply by the copyright holders, but there are also many where the copyrights have expired. An example is the Andy Griffith Show. There were a handful of episodes, 8 or so, that for some reason that Paramount messed up and forgot to renew the copyrights on them. So they are now public domain, and you will find them as bargin bin DVD's. If you look at them, several different companies will release discs of them, but they will always be the same few episodes. They will have the original theme song taken out because it is still under copyright, but the actual episode isn't. Even with the Andy Griffith Show now available as season boxsets, these discs haven't been stopped by Paramount because they simply can't. They don't have the copyright anymore.