Cultural memory preservation should not depend on who can afford it.
The ECO Files is a charitable project that funds cultural heritage documentation for the communities least able to pay for it — tribal nations, senior and memory care programs, veteran families, and diaspora communities across the United States and abroad.
At a glance
- Entity type
- Unincorporated charitable project, fiscally sponsored (Model C)
- Fiscal sponsor
- Non Profit Accounting Service, a 501(c)(3) public charity
- Fiscal sponsor EIN
- 88-3445197
- Founder and director
- Isaiah Bakshi
- Platform partner
- EternalCurrent.Online (CRUNOD LLC)
- Grant applications
- Rolling. Contact us to begin.
How it works
The ECO Files does not build software. It pays for access to a platform that already exists and already works, which is why overhead stays low and grant dollars reach communities directly.
An operating platform
EternalCurrent.Online is a private cultural memory platform built by CRUNOD LLC for families, faith communities, and cultural groups. Families who can afford it pay a subscription.
The ECO Files covers the cost
Grants and donations are received by our fiscal sponsor and used to fund network access for communities that cannot afford a subscription.
The community gets full access
No cost to the community. Full features. The network is permanent — a community owns its stories indefinitely, and can export the whole archive at any time.
Who we serve
Tribal nations and Indigenous communities
Language preservation, oral history, and sovereignty over cultural records. Tribal Historic Preservation Offices and language programs nationwide.
Senior living and memory care
Memory capture before the window closes. Senior living facilities, PACE programs, and families navigating Alzheimer's and dementia.
Immigrant and diaspora communities
Migration stories, language preservation, and cultural continuity across generations and continents.
Veteran and military families
Service histories, unit networks, and the stories that do not make it into official records.
Collegiate and ethnic studies programs
Living primary sources for heritage language courses and ethnic studies cohorts — real migration data, real vocabulary, real family histories.
Other qualifying communities
If your organization serves a community with stories worth preserving and faces financial barriers, reach out. We evaluate every inquiry on its own terms.
Current programs
Grant applications are accepted on a rolling basis.
Indian diaspora cultural heritage documentation
Indian families have settled on every continent. From the 1830s, indenture carried laborers — recruited under contracts many could not read, often by outright deception — to Fiji, Mauritius, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Suriname, South Africa, Kenya, and Myanmar. Later generations left for the Gulf, and more recently for North America, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Southeast Asia.
This program funds documentation of what those families carry: the village they came from, the language spoken at home, the route traveled, and the voices of elders who still remember it.
Tribal Historic Preservation Office partnerships
Networks for Tribal Historic Preservation Offices to document oral histories, preserve cultural vocabulary, and maintain language archives on community terms.
Records stay under the nation's own control and remain exportable at any time. Current outreach across federally recognized nations in Northern California and beyond.
Senior living memory preservation
Grant-funded access for senior living facilities and memory care programs, enabling residents to capture life stories while they are still able to tell them.
Families receive a permanent archive in an elder's own voice, outlasting both the grant and the resident's stay. Partnerships in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond.
Why fund The ECO Files
Cultural heritage is not evenly preserved. Communities with resources document their histories. Communities without them do not. The ECO Files closes that gap directly — every grant dollar funds real access for communities that would otherwise have none.
Because the project funds access to an existing, operational platform, overhead is low. Grants pay for community access, not for building infrastructure that already exists.
Every network funded through The ECO Files is permanent. A community that receives grant-funded access owns its stories indefinitely. Even if funding ends, the content remains intact and exportable until the community chooses to continue or to take its archive elsewhere.
Funding landscape: federal agencies
The project's work aligns with the priorities of the agencies and foundations on this slide and the next. This is not a list of current funders. It is the landscape in which The ECO Files operates and actively seeks support.
Funding landscape: international bodies and foundations
International bodies
Private foundations
Leadership and advisory committee
Isaiah Bakshi
Director and lead
Founder of The ECO Files and co-founder of EternalCurrent.Online. Leads the project's grant programs, community partnerships, and outreach. Hosts ECO Reflections.
Vikas Bakshi
Technical advisor · CRUNOD LLC
Founder and technical lead of EternalCurrent.Online. Brings platform architecture, product strategy, and expertise in diaspora community technology.
Pragati Sharma
Advisor, biopharma
Senior professional in the biopharmaceutical industry. Guides clinical and research partnerships, including memory care and dementia family support.
Vikram Sharma
Advisor, finance
Financial professional with hospitality industry expertise. Advises on fiscal management, grant accounting, and organizational sustainability.
Ziggy Patel
Advisor, community access · VITA
Seventeen consecutive tax seasons volunteering with the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program, preparing returns free of charge for low-income families. Advises on reaching communities for whom cost is the barrier.
ECO Reflections
The project's public podcast
Hosted by Isaiah Bakshi. Conversations with diaspora storytellers, cultural scholars, and community keepers about what families carry and what gets passed forward. Free to listen. Watch season one, episode one, or see all episodes.
Grant and legal details
- Entity type
- Unincorporated charitable project, fiscally sponsored (Model C)
- Fiscal sponsor
- Non Profit Accounting Service, P.O. Box 3, Columbia, CA 95310 · EIN 88-3445197
- Founder and contact
- Isaiah Bakshi — Isaiah@eternalcurrent.online · 650-865-0038. All inquiries, including those for the fiscal sponsor, come through him.
- Platform partner
- EternalCurrent.Online (CRUNOD LLC), a paid platform vendor to the project
- Funding types accepted
- Federal grants · State grants · Foundation grants · Donor-advised funds · Corporate giving · Individual donations
- Grant application
- Rolling. Contact us to begin.
- Due diligence
- Our fiscal sponsor can provide its IRS determination letter and the executed fiscal sponsorship agreement. We can provide program documentation on request.
How we handle money
These terms hold across every grant and program area. Program-specific budgets and rates are published with each program.
- Cost pass-through
- Grant dollars that pay for community access are billed at the platform's published rates. The ECO Files adds no margin and takes no profit on platform charges.
- No overages
- Each grant funds a defined allocation. No overages are charged back to the grant, and none are absorbed by the project.
- What grants pay for
- Community access, program staff time, site travel, and the fiscal sponsor's administrative fee. Nothing else.
- Related-party disclosure
- EternalCurrent.Online is a paid platform vendor to this project. Its founder serves as an unpaid technology advisor and receives no grant funds.
- Family cost
- Relatives view and listen free for the life of the archive. A subscription applies only if a relative contributes recordings of their own, paid directly to the platform.
Contact
Tell us who you are and what you are trying to do — whether you are a community organization seeking access, a funder exploring a partnership, or a journalist researching the program. We respond directly.
The ECO Files is a fiscally sponsored project of Non Profit Accounting Service, a 501(c)(3) public charity (EIN 88-3445197). EternalCurrent.Online is a product of CRUNOD LLC and is a paid platform vendor to the project.