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Quoting hal9g:

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If we re-purpose the existing field to be "Copyright Date", aren't we going to have to recheck every profile to see if the Copyright date is what's in that profile?

Why not leave that data alone as we already know that it is the "Theatrical Release Date" and create a new field for "Copyright"? 

I suspect you'll find as many if more people are actually interested in the "Theatrical Release Date" than the "Copyright Date".

Although I don't mind the addition of the field, the problem is that a lot of people have already admitted that they use the copyright year in the current field rather than find the true release date. So it sounds like the current field is full of inaccurate data anyway.

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Quoting skipnet50:

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The Copyright Date the film was Originally Copyrighted does NOT change. It is part of the film. I don't recall seeiing any distributor change the Copyright date on the film, even despite a restoration, which enables them to re-copyright the film and they may not be the original copyright holder. You will see references to new Copyright information on the Case, but not on the film. Their maybe some public domai prints that do not use that particular part of the film, but then some of those remove the credit data altogether.

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And what if some movie wins an award for say, Best Picture, in 2006, but it has a copyright date of 2001 - and that wouldn't be unheard of.  Anybody that puts down 2001 as the correct date is out to lunch.

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Quoting Rifter:

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Quoting skipnet50:

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The Copyright Date the film was Originally Copyrighted does NOT change. It is part of the film. I don't recall seeiing any distributor change the Copyright date on the film, even despite a restoration, which enables them to re-copyright the film and they may not be the original copyright holder. You will see references to new Copyright information on the Case, but not on the film. Their maybe some public domai prints that do not use that particular part of the film, but then some of those remove the credit data altogether.

Skip

And what if some movie wins an award for say, Best Picture, in 2006, but it has a copyright date of 2001 - and that wouldn't be unheard of.  Anybody that puts down 2001 as the correct date is out to lunch.

The fact that it won an award in 2006 has absolutely nothing to do with when it was produced (copyrighted)!

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Quoting hal9g:

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IF people have been doing this, it has been against the Rules, sicne they were never changed to state that we should be using Copyright date.

Hal, it doesn't matter whether it's against the rules or not. It's a fact (according the poll) that a majority does it, and as such it's the "easier" route to go.

On a sidenote, IF we get a real theatrical release date field, why restrict ourselves to the year? All sources reliable enough (are there any? I have my doubts, sound a lot like everyone's using IMDB for this to me) to get the release year usually list the exact premiere date. That would at least allow perfect sorting in order of their "release".

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John, there is NO perfect answer, and no one is going to be ever be 100% satisfied, and there is no way to allow for every oddball that Hollywood throws at us. Your example is correct but it is also exceedingly rare. It would seem than on the basis of TWO factors; (1)The copyright date is easily obtainable by ALL users and it comes from the film source and (2) the FACT that Theatrical can be very problematic with conflicting information from different sources, that the Copyright Date is the best answer for the Online.

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Quoting hal9g:

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Those who frequent these forums and respond to polls are a minuscule minority of users.  We should not use the results of that poll as a determinant of the state of the data base.  And we certainly shouldn't use it to circumvent the Rules.

They are only a small part of all users, yes, but not a small part of contributors...