Major Update: OA Copyright and Trademarks Requests page

The World Service Office recently posted a thorough update to the OA Copyright and Trademark Requests page (formerly the Copyright Requests page) on staging-frontendrebuild.oa.org to offer the most comprehensive information about how and when registered OA groups and service bodies may use and reproduce bookstore literature, Lifeline stories, logos, and other resources that are the intellectual property of OA, Inc. If you have questions about using and sharing OA materials for your workshop, social media, or service body logo, this page has your answers.

OA’s position has long been to maintain a balance: we want to strengthen our Fifth Tradition by enabling our Fellowship to carry the OA message with as few barriers as possible, yet we must also safeguard OA’s intellectual assets to maintain our Sixth and Seventh Traditions and our legal copyrights and trademarks. To this end, we make as much material available as we can for registered OA service bodies and groups to use without requiring written permissions (so long as OA is appropriately credited) and we restrict usage and deny reprint requests when it is necessary.

We invite you to read and reference our updated Copyright and Trademarks web page when you have questions about using OA materials.

For information about lawfully using non-OA materials, such as stock images for your service body website, see the recently updated Guidelines for Using Copyrighted Materials and Trademarks, which includes answers to many frequently asked questions that can quickly help you decide whether and how to use images and other materials found online. There’s even a fun quiz at the end to test your knowledge. Check it out!

Literature Titles
Automatically translated literature titles appearing on this page are for reference only and may not exactly match the official titles approved by OA, Inc. and A.A. World Services, Inc.

Translation Permission
All registered OA groups and service bodies have permission to translate and reprint any OA document or text currently on the OA website. Permission includes the right to distribute automatically translated material and the right to correct errors in automatic translations. Translation corrections should be as close as possible to the meaning of the original English text, with nothing added or omitted. Translated materials must include this statement in the language of the translation: This is a translation of OA-approved literature. © Overeaters Anonymous, Inc. All rights reserved.

To translate OA documents with significant graphic design, see Free Licensed Images, Translation, and Graphic Design Platform for Intergroups and Service Boards Registered as Nonprofits/Charities.

To obtain OA-approved literature in your language, contact your service body or see the Digital Files in Translation list and Guidelines for Translation of OA literature.

Volunteer to improve translations on staging-frontendrebuild.oa.org. Apply here!