It's marketing. It seems to be generally known for right or wrong reasons, that if you want quality you need an SLR. If you follow a professional photographer around that person is also using an SLR or, if s/he can afford it and justify it, a digital medium format camera.

As a result people tend to conclude that this is the way to superlative quality. And well, it is actually though not at the entry level of the SLRs, at that level the P&S cameras are just as good as are the bridge cameras in my opinion.

But to add to this baffling thread, what I don't understand fully is why people spend the money on an SLR and then proceed to take all their pictures in Auto. Why spend money to control exposure, white balance, ISO etc only to set the camera in Auto?

I realize a partial answer is they don't want to learn and auto is a lot simpler. But by not learning they won't achieve anything better by way of image quality than they can achieve in a high end P&S.

And as I try to get people to understand in my photography seminars ... the camera has no idea what it is you are trying to photograph and what kinds of mood and message you are trying to create. When you set it to Auto all it can do is average the image out. As a result another word for "Auto" is mediocre. So here they are spending a bundle on what's "best" and using it like a P&S. Go figure!