Vitalik Buterin on Idealism in Companies: Slow Growth versus Community Support

ME News reports that on May 25 (UTC+8), Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin tweeted that if a company becomes more "dogmatic" in upholding its principles—such as giving Richard Stallman veto power over Google—the worst outcome would be slower growth, while other companies continue to drive technological progress. In sensitive areas like AGI and military technology, such slowdowns may have been historically undesirable, but in the current context, they may be acceptable or even beneficial. The best outcome, however, would be a company deeply aligned with community values gaining organic support, talent, and marketing resources from the community—support that cannot be easily bought with money alone. He noted that some prior AI companies attempted to achieve similar results through Effective Altruism, but due to the susceptibility of consequentialism to corruption, their impact was ultimately limited. (Source: Foresight News)