Changing the copyright declaration on web pages

using a future date

[longen]

Changing the copyright declaration on web pages annually seems an unnessary chore.
So, how about using a future date - something like Copyright 1999-2080. That way you don't have to make any changes during your lifetime, and save tons of bandwidth from visiting bots who wouldn't have to reindex those pages.
Or would the legal eagles not like it.

[jdMorgan]

It is in fact an unnecessary chore -- you don't have to do it at all.

A work is copyrighted for the life of the author, plus 70 years therafter, regardless of whether the notice is 'updated'. Only 70 years after the death of the author might others (his family/estate) wish to renew the copyright. Actually, the documentation from the U.S. Copyright Office [copyright.gov] specifies that the copyright notice should contain the date of first publication. Other countries' laws are similar, if they are signatories to international copyright treaties.

Only if you make significant changes to the content do you need to update the copyright notice -- And if you're making significant changes, you can take that opportunity to update the copyright notice as well.

If things were otherwise, you'd see book publishers having to recall their products annually, so that the copyright notice page could be updated.

If you feel you must update the copyright notice, then you can easily use PHP, PERL, or Server-Side Includes to do so.

For example, an HTML notice using SSI on Apache server:

<p>Copyright &copy; <!--#config timefmt="%Y" --><!--#echo var="DATE_LOCAL" --> WidgetWorld, Inc.</p>

Jim