I learned that indeed you can find all of the old game console emulators and ROM's online, which makes my previous post even more exciting! This means I can play all of my old 2600, N64 and SNES games on my computer without having to plug in the old game systems. As far as I can tell, that's totally legal because I own the originals and it predates copy protection and the DMCA. Sweet!
It's becoming clear that I need a better TV to play this computer-based stuff...
On one of the TWiT's... about 7 or so episodes ago, they talk about the DMCA and how it relates to ROMs and the wording makes it sound like the ROM copy protection only lasts like 15 years or so. Whatever they were talking about, the wording makes it appear that all NES games should be fine do to the age of the system.