Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has published a detailed commentary challenging the concept of "pretend neutrality" in the corporate world and reaffirming the core decentralized ethos of the Ethereum network. In a post on X, Buterin emphasized that while the Ethereum protocol itself is neutral and permissionless, the individuals and builders within its ecosystem should not be afraid to voice their own cultural and political principles.
Buterin made a sharp distinction between protocol neutrality and personal neutrality. He stated, "You do not have to agree with my view that Berlin has the best food in Europe, suits and ties should be expunged from our culture, and YYYY-MM-DD is the best date format to use Ethereum." He stressed that the "whole concept" of censorship resistance means users are free to ignore him, the Ethereum Foundation, or client developers entirely.
The Ethereum founder argued that true neutrality is reserved for protocols like HTTP, Bitcoin, and Ethereum. He criticized the "modern world" for promoting a sanitized, corporate neutrality where individuals "put on a suit and claim to be equally open to all perspectives." Instead, Buterin advocated for having the "courage to clearly state one's principles" and build technology that reflects those values.
Buterin also addressed the nature of criticism within a free speech framework. He explained that labeling an application as "corposlop"—a term he used to describe "soulless, trend-following homogeneity"—does not constitute censorship. "This has always been the flip side of the grand bargain of free speech: I am not free to shut you down, but I am free to criticize you, much as you are free to criticize me," he wrote.
To illustrate his point, Buterin drew a parallel to Linux, noting that while it is a tool for user empowerment, it also serves as the "base layer of a lot of the world's corposlop." He argued that for those who care about freedom, it is not enough to just build the kernel; they must also "build a full-stack ecosystem compatible with those values." He sees Ethereum similarly, as a base layer that can support a multitude of applications and "metaverses" built on overlapping yet distinct sets of principles.
