diff --git a/Lib/distutils/__init__.py b/Lib/distutils/__init__.py
index 9c60e54..21d34c7 100644
--- a/Lib/distutils/__init__.py
+++ b/Lib/distutils/__init__.py
@@ -12,6 +12,12 @@
 
 __revision__ = "$Id$"
 
-import sys
-__version__ = "%d.%d.%d" % sys.version_info[:3]
-del sys
+# Distutils version
+#
+# Please coordinate with Marc-Andre Lemburg <mal@egenix.com> when adding
+# new features to distutils that would warrant bumping the version number.
+#
+# In general, major and minor version should loosely follow the Python
+# version number the distutils code was shipped with.
+#
+__version__ = "2.5.0"