Superseded as the sharing unit by #18’s full committed Memory repository contract; ADR-0131 records the current Marketplace order.

SoulSnapshot is an immutable, content-addressed package

Sharing a PersonaBot means freezing its Soul — persona and selected memory — into a SoulSnapshot: a self-contained zip whose entry point is bot.md (YAML front-matter manifest + human-written setup instructions), always carrying PERSONA.md, and optionally a filtered memory/ tree. A snapshot is immutable and content-addressed (digest over the archive); the registry stores it in R2 under that digest and models a Listing (@handle/slug) as a pointer to Versions (human-named tags → digests), so old versions stay importable for later “clone from a point in time”. A snapshot is never a git repo pointer: the local memory repo remains local-only history, and a Soul export materializes the snapshot from a ref (git archive, honoring export-ignore plus ad-hoc exclusions, then re-scanning the final manifest). Attachments, credentials, sessions, workspaces, bindings, and .git history never travel in a SoulSnapshot; ADR-0040 defines a separate PersonaBot Export that may wrap the snapshot with explicitly selected operational facets without changing this registry unit.

Considered Options

• Share a repo reference (remote + ref) instead of a snapshot — rejected: history leaks pre-redaction content, requires a reachable remote, and couples recipients to the sender’s git.
• Mutable listing = live bot — rejected: recipients need reproducibility and rollback; the registry keeps immutable versions behind a latest pointer.
• Globally unique names — rejected: collisions and squatting; namespace per handle (Docker-style), display name separate.
• DRM on share_policy — rejected: honor system plus UI warnings; a re-export must preserve provenance.upstream and the original license.

Consequences

• bot.md v1 carries: format / format_version / kind (template | handoff | backup) / exported_at / app; bot identity (slug, display_name, avatar, tags); includes (memory none | shared | all | paths, attachments false, git_history false); redactions[]; requires (plugins/tools — declared, never auto-installed); license (public listings default CC-BY-4.0); share_policy (allowed | ask | no-redistribution); provenance (account, listing, upstream, source_commit).
• Identifier URLs are fixed now even though the harness plugin is later: botharness.ai/b/<handle>/<slug> and botharness://install/<handle>/<slug>@<version>.
• Import always creates a fresh PersonaBot (new slug/repo, one source=import commit); private memory never leaves in template/handoff and is only exportable in a confirmed backup.
• Memory rules gain one requirement: every memory write carries a summary that becomes the git commit message.
• The Soul registry publishes only SoulSnapshots. Operational facets, provider account references, Service Grant declarations, and Messaging Archives are never registry Versions.