Privacy notice
Last updated: 3 November 2026
AO Commons is a nonprofit research initiative advancing the safety, reliability, and governance of autonomous organizations through research, open infrastructure, and collaboration.
This privacy notice explains what personal information we collect through our website, research projects, community programs, newsletter, and events, how we use it, and what choices you have.
For privacy questions or requests, contact legal@aocommons.org.
1. Information we collect
Get involved form
When you express interest in AO Commons, we may collect your name, email address, organization, professional background, LinkedIn or GitHub profiles, areas of interest, and information about how you would like to participate.
The form saves responses as you go, starting with your email address. This means we may retain information even if you do not complete the form.
We use Airtable to store these responses and manage our communications with prospective collaborators, researchers, and participants.
We use this information to follow up on your interests, identify opportunities to collaborate, and coordinate participation in our activities.
Completing the form does not automatically subscribe you to our newsletter.
Newsletter
When you subscribe to our newsletter, we collect your email address and any additional information you voluntarily provide.
We use beehiiv to manage subscriptions, deliver newsletters, and process unsubscribes. beehiiv may also collect information about newsletter delivery, opens, and link clicks.
You can unsubscribe at any time using the link included in each newsletter.
Events
We organize research summits, workshops, and other events, sometimes with partner institutions.
We use Luma for event registration. Depending on the event, we may receive your name, email address, organizational affiliation, and responses to registration questions.
We use this information to manage attendance, communicate event information, and coordinate relevant follow-up activities.
Where events are co-hosted, relevant registration information may be shared with co-organizers for event administration.
Some events may be photographed or recorded. When applicable, we will provide information about photography and recording through event materials or at the event.
Attending an event does not automatically subscribe you to our newsletter.
Research and open-source contributions
AO Commons develops open research resources, including its Knowledge Graph of autonomous organization and multi-agent systems research.
These resources may contain publicly available professional information, including researcher names, institutional affiliations, publication details, and links to research or professional profiles.
This information may come from academic publications, research repositories, institutional websites, public datasets, or contributions submitted directly to us.
We use it to attribute research, document the field, connect related work, and identify open research questions.
Some of this information is publicly accessible. Contributions made through public GitHub repositories, issues, or pull requests may also be publicly visible.
If information about you is inaccurate or you have concerns about its inclusion, contact us at legal@aocommons.org.
Direct communications
If you contact us by email or another communication channel, we may retain your contact details and correspondence to respond to your inquiry or manage an ongoing collaboration.
Website visits
Our website is hosted by Vercel, which processes technical information such as IP addresses, browser information, requested pages, and security logs to operate and protect the site.
We use Google Fonts. When fonts are loaded from Google's servers, your browser sends technical information, including your IP address, to Google.
2. Cookies and analytics
AO Commons does not currently use advertising trackers or third-party website analytics on aocommons.org.
Essential cookies or similar technologies may be used by services necessary to operate or protect the website.
Third-party services linked from our website, including Luma, beehiiv, and GitHub, have their own privacy and cookie practices.
Our newsletter provider may measure email opens and link clicks. This is separate from website analytics.
If we introduce non-essential tracking, we will update this notice and provide additional choices where required by law.
3. How and why we use information
We use personal information to operate AO Commons, communicate with our community, support research collaborations, organize events, and maintain our public resources.
For individuals covered by the EU or UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), we rely on the following legal bases, as applicable:
| Purpose | Legal basis |
|---|---|
| Sending newsletters | Consent |
| Responding to inquiries and expressions of interest | Legitimate interests |
| Coordinating research programs and partnerships | Legitimate interests or steps taken before entering an agreement |
| Organizing events and communicating with participants | Legitimate interests or performance of a contract, as applicable |
| Maintaining public research records and attribution | Legitimate interests |
| Operating and securing our website | Legitimate interests |
| Meeting applicable legal obligations | Legal obligation |
Our legitimate interests include advancing scientific research, maintaining accurate records, facilitating collaboration, and operating our organization securely.
Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw it at any time.
We do not use personal information for solely automated decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects on individuals.
4. Who we share information with
We use third-party services to operate our website and programs, including:
- Airtable: Storing expressions of interest and managing community relationships.
- beehiiv: Managing newsletter subscriptions and delivery.
- Luma: Event registration and administration.
- Vercel: Website hosting and security.
- Google Fonts: Delivering website fonts.
- GitHub: Hosting public code repositories and contributions.
We may also share relevant information with event co-organizers, participating research institutions, fiscal sponsors, professional advisers, or service providers where necessary for the activities described in this notice.
We may disclose information if required by law or necessary to protect our systems, organization, or participants.
Professional information included in our open research resources may be publicly accessible.
We do not sell or rent personal information or share it with advertising networks for targeted advertising.
Our service providers may also process information under their own privacy policies.
5. International transfers
AO Commons is based in the United States and collaborates with researchers and institutions internationally.
Personal information may be processed in the United States or other countries where our service providers operate.
Where EU or UK data protection rules apply, international transfers must be supported by an applicable adequacy decision or other appropriate safeguards, such as Standard Contractual Clauses or UK transfer arrangements.
You can contact legal@aocommons.org for information about applicable safeguards.
6. How long we keep information
We keep personal information for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this notice, subject to legal obligations.
- Get involved responses: Retained while relevant to an existing or prospective collaboration. Incomplete responses are subject to a separate retention period.
- Newsletter subscriptions: Retained until you unsubscribe or request deletion, except limited information needed to honor your opt-out.
- Event registrations: Retained for event administration, relevant follow-up, and any required recordkeeping.
- Correspondence: Retained while necessary to respond to inquiries or maintain relevant organizational records.
- Research records: Public authorship and attribution information may be retained while relevant to our research resources, subject to applicable rights and correction requests.
- Technical logs: Retained according to our hosting provider's configured retention periods and security requirements.
We delete or anonymize information when it is no longer needed, where reasonably possible. Some records may be retained longer where required by law.
7. Security
We take reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect personal information against unauthorized access, misuse, loss, or disclosure.
Access to personal information is limited to people who need it for their work, and we use established service providers for storage and communications.
No online system can be guaranteed completely secure.
Please avoid submitting sensitive personal information, passwords, or confidential research data through our public forms unless specifically requested through an appropriate channel.
8. Your rights and choices
You can contact legal@aocommons.org to:
- Request access to personal information we hold about you.
- Correct inaccurate or outdated information.
- Request deletion of your information.
- Withdraw newsletter consent or opt out of optional communications.
- Raise concerns about our use of personal information.
Depending on your location and applicable law, you may also have rights to restrict or object to processing and to receive certain information in a portable format.
If you are covered by the EU or UK GDPR, these rights apply subject to applicable legal conditions and exceptions.
You have the right to object to the processing of your personal information for direct marketing.
We may need to verify your identity before responding to certain requests. We will respond within the time limits required by applicable law.
You may also lodge a complaint with your data protection authority.
UK residents can contact the Information Commissioner's Office. Individuals in the European Economic Area can contact their national data protection authority.
9. Children
Our website, newsletter, events, and research programs are not directed toward children under 13.
We do not knowingly collect personal information directly from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided personal information, please contact us.
10. External services
Our website links to third-party websites, research publications, repositories, and other services.
Those services operate under their own privacy policies. We encourage you to review them before providing personal information.
11. Updates to this notice
We may update this notice as our organization, programs, and technology develop.
When we make changes, we will update the date at the top of this page. For significant changes, we will provide additional notice where appropriate or required by law.
12. Contact
For privacy questions, requests, or concerns:
AO Commons
Email: legal@aocommons.org
Website: aocommons.org