Glossary — Site continuity
What is static-mode site continuity?
Service consisting of migrating an existing website to a static version, without backend or interactive database, to keep it online when the publishing company winds down. Content stays accessible to visitors, the domain name is kept, but no new interactions are served.
What it is
Static-mode site continuity is the operation that turns a living site — often run by a CMS, a database and an application server — into a read-only archived site. Concretely, a complete HTML copy of the site is generated (all pages, media, stylesheets), deposited in object storage (Scaleway, French data centres), and served behind Cloudflare as the frontal CDN.
Visitors see the same site as before. Internally, no application engine runs anymore: no database, no authentication, no active form, no cart. Operating costs drop — a few euros per month for an independent site — which makes long-term preservation economically sustainable.
Why it matters
When a company closes, its site disappears in 90% of cases — through expiry of the hosting, the domain or the TLS certificate. That is a dead loss for former clients, partners, the inbound links accumulated over fifteen years, and the digital memory of the project. Static migration is the only way to maintain that presence at a cost compatible with a post-cessation budget, while properly transferring editorial liability.
How Archivum approaches it
Site continuity is one of Archivum's three service lines. It is conditioned on the contractual transfer of editorial rights: during the contract's duration, Archivum carries the responsibility for the published content. At end of period, the contract settles deletion, renewal, or final transfer — terms set on a case-by-case basis.