[ars]

The year is supposed to be the first year the work was created. You can do 2008-2012 if you want though (and let the end year automatically update). But since that's the assumption if you don't include the end year, there isn't any reason to do it.

[kdommeyer]

Facebook © 2012

The content of Facebook wasn't first created in 2012, so I'm not sure if you're correct. In fact, I've noticed that the majority of sites don't include a date-range. Regardless, thanks for the info.

[Terretta]

The page you're looking at was just created.

[GreekOphion]

Didn't Facebook just update their website thus having a new copy write?

[ars]

No, it's a mistake, they should have left the original date. If you update it you are supposed to do year, year, year or a range.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_notice

[kdommeyer]

I still doubt that Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, Twitter, etc. are all mistaken in listing the current year in their copyright. That seems implausible.

[phillmv]

Things aren't as cut and dry with legal traditions. I'm sure there are tons of scraps of legal language that remain in use only because it's traditional and few people know any better. Like some kind of legal shibboleth.

Like coderdude said above[1], whenever you see "All Rights Reserved"[2] you're seeing it in action.

1. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3541501 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_rights_reserved

[kdommeyer]

I don't know. They might have; but I doubt Microsoft, Yahoo, and Twitter did as well.

© 2012 Microsoft

Copyright © 2012 Yahoo! Inc.

© 2012 Twitter

[ars]

I quote the US government: http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-definitions.html

"and the year of first publication"

[kdommeyer]

It appears that you're correct, but I'm still having a hard time believing that the legal departments of almost every major company make the same mistake. That makes me think that there is something we're missing.

[chc]

I'm going to guess the missing thing is that the legal department wasn't the one that implemented the autoupdating date.

[benologist]

They could be counting the year it was rendered on your computer. That seems a bit wonky though.

[notatoad]

with the way copyright works, is the notice necessary at all? if you put the wrong date at the bottom of your website, it doesn't invalidate your copyright. i could put © 2047 at the bottom of my site if i wanted to.

[ugh]

It isn’t. Copyright is automatic.

[coderdude]

Copyright is automatic where it is automatic. In the United States you don't need a copyright statement. Also, no matter where you're from, "all rights reserved" is meaningless (post-Berne Convention).

[tptacek]

It's (as I understand it) legally meaningless, but it's not "meaningless": it's a socially acceptable way to express the sentiment of "this is not open source or in any way something I am sharing with the public". Avoiding confusion is a good thing. It's like the opposite of a GPL COPYING file.