Public goods technology is digital infrastructure that is open, shared, and designed to serve broad public benefit.
Public goods technology is digital infrastructure that is open, shared, and designed to serve broad public benefit.
These technologies are generally built to support digital inclusion, user privacy, financial access, and public participation.
“Don’t be evil” architecture asks users to trust a company or platform, while “can’t be evil” architecture uses code to limit what anyone can do.
Technologies are tools that reflect the intentions and values of the people or groups that operate them. To avoid exploitation of a platform or technology by a single party, core principles can be built directly into the technology’s design. This is called “can’t be evil” architecture.
Traditional approaches to censorship resistance, data protection, and user privacy generally rely on policy compliance rather than technical enforcement. This is called a “don't be evil” approach that relies on corporate goodwill. Even with regulation, users’ rights can be difficult to protect if one company or platform controls the system.
Finance is another major use case. Open payment networks can make transfers cheaper and more accessible, especially for users who lack reliable access to banks.
Public goods technology must protect users while still being simple enough for ordinary people to use.
The goal is to create digital infrastructure where only actions benefiting the ecosystem are viable, ensuring the system remains accessible and resistant to capture by special interests. However, this does not always translate into an easy experience for end users.
Many systems that protect user rights also add complexity. Simplifying these systems can make them easier to use, but it may also require users to give up some control, transparency, or autonomy.
This helps explain the limited uptake of traditional public goods technologies like Linux or the Tor browser. Both are powerful tools, but unfamiliar UX and technical requirements may keep them out of reach for some people.
This can be remedied by treating usability as part of the technology’s values. Infrastructure that is technically free but practically unusable still fails many of the communities it was built to serve. The most durable public goods technologies treat accessibility as a design requirement, not an afterthought.
Public good washing is when a project calls itself a public good without building openness, user protection, or shared benefit into its design.
For example, a project may use the term “public good” in marketing to suggest that it has broad utility, even when its architecture does not reflect public good values. This has led some developers to simply call their projects “open source,” meaning the code is available for others to use, inspect, or build on.
A project is more likely to be a true public good if it:
Makes bad faith actions either technically impossible or economically unviable by design.
Is open to all and not depleted by use.
Builds user and ecosystem protections into its architecture, reducing the risk that it can be captured, censored, or exploited by one dominant party.
Corey holds a PhD in computational chemical physics from Texas Tech University, a field that drew him to the Bitcoin ecosystem in 2011. Since then, he has made contributions to blockchain security, with the goal of safeguarding civil liberties in the digital age.
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