Updating the copyright year in the footer of your website tells the visitor that the site is up to date. Showing the year is especially important if you have a site without dates in its content.
PHP
current year: © <?php echo date("Y") ?> with start year 2008: © 2008-<?php echo date("Y") ?>
JAVASCRIPT
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript"> var today = new Date() var year = today.getFullYear() document.write(year) </script>