+How to Maintain Copyright Years for GNU Emacs
+ (see also file "copyright" in this directory)
+"Our lawyer says it is ok if we add, to each file that has been in Emacs
+ since Emacs 21 came out in 2001, all the subsequent years[1]. We don't
+ need to check whether *that file* was changed in those years.
+ It's sufficient that *Emacs* was changed in those years (and it was!).
- THIS DOCUMENT IS UNDER REVIEW.
+ For those files that have been added since then, we should add
+ the year it was added to Emacs, and all subsequent years."
- DO NOT FOLLOW THESE INSTRUCTIONS -- THEY ARE NOT CORRECT.
+ --RMS, 2005-07-13
+[1] Note that this includes 2001 - see
+<http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-pretest-bug/2006-12/msg00119.html>
-How to Maintain Copyright Years for GNU Emacs
+
+For the refcards under etc/, it's ok to simply use the latest year
+(typically in a `\def\year{YEAR}' expression) for the rendered copyright
+notice, while maintaining the full list of years in the copyright notice
+in the comments.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+
+Following is the policy that we tried to write down one time (mid 2005).
+Although it is incorrect, we keep it around to remind us how complicated
+things used to be (and may become in the future).
Principle: Individual files need to have the year of the release