Old Archives Closed!

Due to threats of legal actions by A.A. World Services and wishing to avoid creating a public controversy, we are closing our old archives. From now on, our Archives and Daily Thoughts will only consist of material that are in public domain.

For further info, see email below.

Dear [aaonline.net],

We have written to you several years ago (see the attached letters) regarding your website’s unauthorized use of Alcoholics Anonymous copyrighted material, and we have now been informed that your site is sending serialized excerpts of Alcoholics Anonymous copyrighted material, which are being sent to your email subscribers as “Daily Thought” postings.

I would assume that your intentions are to help carry the message, and that's certainly a praiseworthy objective that we all share, as members. However, Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. (“AAWS”) has been charged with the responsibility of preserving the integrity of the A.A. message, as articulated in A.A. literature, and of protecting and preserving A.A.'s intellectual property rights - copyrights, trademarks and service marks, etc. - which have been entrusted to A.A.W.S. for safe-keeping. In carrying out its responsibilities, A.A.W.S. must take such reasonable steps as are available by doing so, A.A.W.S. is doing what it can to help ensure that the A.A. program will be available to all those A.A. members to come, in the future.

However, your apparent indifference to our earlier communications has served only to heighten our concern for the risks to the integrity of the AA message, as well as to the stability of our copyright registrations, that have been occasioned by your infringing activities.

If the foregoing reasons are not sufficiently persuasive, we should note that copyright infringement is a violation of federal law, and, in some circumstances, constitutes a crime under federal law.

At this point, then, we must insist that you discontinue your unlawful use of materials owned and copyrighted by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., and that you do so upon receipt of this letter.

Sincerely,

Darlene Smith
Intellectual Property Administrator
A.A. World Services, Inc.
New York, NY