I have been drawing together a number of threads. One is about stories: my daughter-in-law’s father wrote and published his own story not long before he died; my cousin travels the globe capturing stories from our relatives and asks me to help share them with the family. I wrote my father’s and my brother's stories which I, too, want to share. Our motivation is to capture these family stories with as much rich detail as possible and to make them available to our extended family as an enduring family asset.

Alongside that, several members of the family have been researching our family tree and have commented on how much they have gained from this.

My hypothesis is that an archive which can be preserved and passed down through the generations will provide a map of one’s family history that can provide members of the family with continuity and stability, can create greater meaning in one’s life and can strengthen one’s sense of self and distinctiveness.

A second thread arises from the understanding we now have about the extent of the data surveillance being carried out by global technology companies. A fightback against that ‘dataveillance’ is under way and I am exploring the feasibility of using open source software to provide people with ethical, privacy-conscious online services; ie services which do not engage in data surveillance of the type carried out by Facebook, etc. Early feedback suggests a preliminary focus could usefully be on services that provide families or family groups with safe space for the many things they want to share and do online.

These two threads – the need for more privacy online and the desire to reinforce family identity – are the prime motivators for this line of thinking.

A goal is to enable safe, private, communication amongst members of the family diaspora via person-to-person or shared messaging, chat, video call and email.

A second goal is to provide a family archive; that is, a repository for the many things which have a connection with past and present family members and friends, that are personal to the family, and that can be digitised so as to be passed down the generations. These include: photographs and videos; the documents associated with different life stages such as birth, marriage and death certificates; wills; letters; recipes; family stories; and so on. Ideally, the archive would enable email and other messages to be captured for posterity, if so desired, rather than simply being erased after death as happens now. Digital preservation would be an important feature of these spaces.