From the start we wanted this version of the Bible, unfortunately it has copyright protection (unlike the King James Version which is freely available) and therefore we wanted to be sure we were legal before we added any NIV text.

So we went to Zondervan who own the permissions for publishing the NIV version in the US to see what we could do. They replied :

"We are not allowing the entire NIV version to be housed on any website except BibleGateway.com. I know that with what your site the person visiting would only be able to see one chapter at a time, but we still cannot allow you to 'house' the entire Bible on your website."

So that pretty much stopped us doing what we were doing with the King James Version, but we also got told:

"There are a couple of options so that you can still use the NIV. (We are not trying to discourage its use, but we want to maintain control of it for the sake of accuracy and protect the copyright.) You can post a chapter on your site as long as you do not archive the chapters so that they add up to more than 500 verses. So you could change the text and put a new chapter up every day and this would not be a problem at all. Or your other option is to link to BibleGateway.com. You can link and provide access to the entire Bible without having it housed on your site. I understand that this would not be the same format as you are offering on your site."

So this is pretty much what we have done, hard work yes but I think you'll agree it adds to the site? Thus for Daily Readings we limit to housing just 5 days worth which should be no where near to the 500 verse limit. For all other areas (Weekly Readings, Searches etc) we provide direct links to BibleGateway.com to allow you to view our readings in NIV format.

Hope this adds to your enjoyment of the site.