Board Thread:General Nerf discussion/@comment-5065259-20130619155616/@comment-2234967-20130620220850

Copyright year and release year are different from one another. A blaster might share the same year for both copyright and release (my Triad has a copyright year of 2012), but my Alpha Trooper has a copyright year of 2009 and a release year of 2010; my Jolt also has a copyright year of 2010 and a release year of 2011.

Something can be copyrighted way before it's released to the public. This is just really to ensure that another company can't take the design, remake and sell it, and get away with it... at least within certain countries (this certainly isn't stopping companies like Leyuan).

So, it's better if we go off of the year it was released instead of copyright year.