Copyright Information
The Outcomes Star™ is the intellectual property of Triangle Consulting Social Enterprise Ltd.
The key copyright requirements for the Outcomes Star are:
- Every member of staff in an organisation who is using the Star must have a Star licence and have completed Star training from a licensed Star trainer
- Each version of the Star must not be copied and derivative works cannot be produced
- Each version of the Star must not be modified or adapted in anyway
- No translations of any version of the Star should be undertaken without agreement from Triangle
- If any aspect of the Outcomes Star is included in a software system and Star data is entered into that system, the provider of that system must be approved by Triangle
- If any aspect of the Outcomes Star intellectual property is reproduced or referenced in anyway, you must acknowledge Triangle’s copyright.
Guidelines for referencing or reproducing the Outcomes Star in your materials
If you would like to include a reference to any version of the Outcomes Star including the outcome areas, Journey of Change or Star visuals, you must acknowledge Triangle’s copyright. Triangle have produced a short guide explaining what this involves – click here to download.
Licensed Star users are entitled to reproduce Star intellectual property in their own case management paperwork and service user documentation. Triangle have created easy to follow guidelines to support organisations in this process – click here to download.
Why are the Outcomes Stars only available under licence?
When the first Outcomes Star was published in 2006, Triangle’s only aim was to make sure the tool was available as widely as possible and to enable as many organisations as possible to evidence and learn from their achievements. Our view at that time was that the Stars were clear and intuitive tools and that the role for Triangle was just to make them available.
10 years on, we have learnt from repeated experience that to benefit from using the Stars services must use them well, and that using the Star well requires training, effective data analysis and thought-through implementation. Triangle’s licence and training model allows us to provide useful services to organisations and helps us to protect the integrity of the tool. Although the original Outcomes Star was covered by a Creative Commons copyright, its freely available status led to many instances of the Star being copied or changed, often at varying levels of quality, testing and effectiveness – but still under the banner of an ‘outcomes star.’ While we understand the desire to customise the Star to meet the needs of individual services, the Stars are designed to be sector-wide tools, and because of this it’s vital that any tool being called an Outcomes Star is true to the version Triangle have created, tested thoroughly and published.
For more information about Triangle’s policy on providing access to the Star, please see our Pricing Policy or contact us if you have any queries.