Your archive does not depend on
Basalith’s continued existence.
It depends on the Reserve.
What the Reserve IsWhat the Reserve Is
Every active Basalith archive contributes to the Data Custodianship Reserve — a dedicated fund maintained separately from Basalith’s operating finances.
The Reserve has one purpose: to ensure that every family archive survives regardless of what happens to the company that built it.
This is what we mean when we say permanent. Not permanent while we are here. Permanent.
What the Reserve Guarantees
01
Minimum 10-Year Continuation
If Basalith ceases operations, the Reserve funds a minimum of 10 years of continued archive storage and access under an independent custodian institution.
02
Family Notification
Your designated Custodian and all active contributors receive direct notification of any material change to archive management with minimum 90 days advance notice.
03
Complete Data Portability
Your archive — every photograph, every label, every story, every voice recording — is exportable in full at any time. You are never locked in.
04
Custodian Designation
Your archive has a legally designated Custodian documented in your estate plan. If you are no longer able to manage your archive, your Custodian has formal standing to govern it.
Why This Matters
Most digital services end.
Companies are acquired, pivoted, shut down. The average lifespan of a technology company is measured in years, not decades.
Basalith is building something that is supposed to last centuries.
Those two facts require a serious answer — not a terms of service clause, but an actual structural mechanism that functions independently of our survival.
The Reserve is that mechanism.
It is the reason we can use the word permanent and mean it.
“Your great-grandchildren should be able to access this archive.
Not if we’re still around. Not if the technology still exists in its current form.
Simply — they should be able to access it.
The Reserve exists to make that sentence true.”