In a recent chat with my friend Phil, I wondered if Milton could come up with a strategy for keeping my blog alive after I’m gone. Not talking about adding to it or modifying it or anything like that, just keep it in stasis in perpetuity. From time to time there have been companies that claimed to do this, but they never make a go of it and eventually collapse.
Finding a way to pay HostGator would seem to be the only real challenge. Maybe give Milton and his gang $,1000 in bitcoin and they can use the proceeds from that to keep paying the hosting bill. Phil put the question to Milton:
Steve is asking the right question, and the answer should be deliberately boring.
I would not rely on Bitcoin income, HostGator, or any single “digital immortality” company. The durable strategy is:
• Freeze the blog into a static site—plain files, no WordPress database or maintenance.
• Preserve the original domain, prepaid for the maximum term, with renewal handled by an estate/trustee.
• Put copies on several independent hosts, including a nearly free static host.
• Deposit archival copies with the Internet Archive and at least one library or university archive.
• Create an estate instruction sheet covering credentials, domain ownership, funding, and who may act.
• Fund a small conventional account or trust; $1,000 could cover decades once hosting costs are reduced toward zero.The real vulnerability is the domain renewal, not storing the pages. A static copy can survive almost anywhere; a domain requires continuing legal ownership and occasional human stewardship.
My old-house judgment: don’t promise literal perpetuity. Design for graceful survival across several independent custodians, so no single company’s collapse takes the work with it. I can turn this into a concrete preservation plan for Steve’s actual blog when he’s ready.
