One Drunk to Another Jittery and Alone
Watch The Kitchen Table
Alcoholics AnonymousBox 459, Grand Central StationNew York, NY 10163
Illustration · The kitchen table from 1 · Lone Endeavor at first light: the Big Book, a yellow bulletin, a letter to Box 459, a phone and a cup of coffee. Not drawn from a photograph.

2021 and after

Legacy

In 2021 AA’s Conference stopped counting online meetings as correspondence and called them groups, and the older routes stayed open.

“…recognize online groups and encourage their participation…”

The 71st General Service Conference, in an action of April 2021 · Advisory Actions of the General Service Conference, 2021

Groups, not letters

AA’s service structure is built on maps. Groups send representatives to districts, districts to areas, and each area sends a delegate to the General Service Conference in New York. A group that met on a screen had no place on the map, and since 1997 the Conference had designated online groups “International Correspondence Meetings.”

In April 2021 the 71st Conference, meeting online for the second year, changed that. The general service structure of the United States and Canada would “recognize online groups and encourage their participation,” listing any that asked in the district and area of their choice, or else where their main contact lived. The same Conference asked the General Service Board to form a committee to explore how online groups might take part further.

The Online Intergroup kept growing. It registered as a nonprofit in 2022, and in October 2024 it held its first online international convention: three days, more than 70 meetings, hosted by over 50 groups from 18 countries. By its count, more than 7,000 members attended.

The older routes are still open. The Loners-Internationalists Meeting, which began with the captain’s round robin in 1949, still goes out every two months, by email and by post, to Loners, to Homers who can’t leave home, to Internationalists at sea, and to the Port Contacts and Loner Sponsors who write to them. The Grapevine comes every month. The Corrections Correspondence Service still pairs members inside with members outside, by letter.

And at the back of the Big Book, under “How to Get in Touch With A.A.,” is an offer the book’s first draft couldn’t make. The loan copy of 1939 warned, “we may be unable to reply to all inquiries.” Today’s book promises a letter to the General Service Office “a prompt reply,” and, where there is no group nearby, a correspondence “no matter how isolated you are.”

Listen Legacy About 1 minute

Then and now

Still open

Every route in this piece, the year it opened, and where it stands today.

Today’s details from aa.org, the Grapevine and the Online Intergroup, as of 2026.

  1. 1938A book in the mail

    Todayaa.org posts the Big Book chapter by chapter, to read or to hear, and it has been translated into more than 70 languages.

    1 · Lone Endeavor

  2. 1939An answer from the office

    TodayThe book prints the General Service Office’s address, Box 459, Grand Central Station, and offers a correspondence wherever there is no group.

    2 · No form letters

  3. 1942A group inside the walls

    TodayMembers carry meetings into prisons, and the Corrections Correspondence Service pairs members inside with members outside, by letter.

    3 · Inside the walls

  4. 1944A paper in the mail

    TodayThe Grapevine comes out every month, in print, online and in an app.

    4 · Ink-stained wretches

  5. 1949A round robin

    TodayThe Loners-Internationalists Meeting goes out every two months, by email and by post.

    5 · A loner at sea

  6. 1966A conference call

    TodayPhone meetings are listed with online ones, in the Meeting Guide app and by the Online Intergroup.

    6 · Bulletin boards

  7. 1986A bulletin board

    TodayThe Online Intergroup serves groups that meet by video and telephone, on message boards, by email and in chat rooms.

    6 · Bulletin boards

  8. 2020A meeting on a screen

    TodaySince 2021 an online group can be listed like any other, in the district and area it chooses.

    7 · Can you hear me?

No matter how isolated

The book a stranger read alone in 1938 now ends with an offer to anyone who reads it far from a meeting: write, and someone will write back.

For a closer look

Go deeper

What the action of 2021 replaced and left open; the Online Intergroup’s first convention; and the address at the back of the book.

From correspondence to group

The action of 2021 replaced the one of 1997 outright. An online group that asks is listed in its preferred district and area; if it names none, the default is wherever its primary contact lives.

Online members had been asking for more for years. In 2002, the Grapevine reported, online representatives met “hoping to establish a service conference for AA in cyberspace.”

The Conference of 2021 asked the board to explore what came next for online groups in the structure. It also asked the trustees for a way to poll the Conference itself between its yearly meetings by video, with real-time discussion and debate.

A convention online

The Online Intergroup’s first convention ran from October 25 to 27, 2024, in four virtual rooms, with a day for each part of the world in turn: Asia and Oceania, then the Americas, then Europe, Africa and Asia. It called the weekend a “virtual trip around the world.”

It planned a second for 2025.

Box 658 to Box 459

The first readers wrote to Box 658 at the Church Street Annex post office in New York, and Ruth Hock answered each letter herself, as 2 · No form letters tells. The first edition’s Foreword said only that AA would be interested to hear from readers who were getting results, “particularly from those who have commenced work with other alcoholics.”

The fourth edition, of 2001, gives Box 459 at Grand Central Station, and the website, aa.org. The current ebook of AA Comes of Age invites a letter or an email.

Sources