Abstract

Public Nouns was founded on a simple and effective premise: public goods are underfunded, so let us fork the NounsDAO funding mechanism to raise and direct funds to public goods projects. Over the past three and a half years, Public Nouns has succeeded in this mission, funding over 200k to public goods projects within the Ethereum ecosystem and beyond. But the terrain has shifted, both culturally and technologically. Funding has dried up and the urgency of public goods has increased.

We believe the best way to fund real public goods today is to fight for the cultural and market dominance of open source and cypherpunk values. This proposal seeks to deploy the remaining 10 ETH in the Public Nouns treasury toward a strategic modernization of the project in service of that thesis. Our goals are to:

• Rebrand from Public Nouns to Private Nouns as a provocation and commitment, marking a transition from open-ended public goods to a tighter thesis around proliferating the full stack of sovereign technologies.
• Improve capital inflows by implementing more open-ended funding mechanisms, replacing auction friction with flexible donation infrastructure and proportional governance rights.
• Deploy convertible grants that flow back to the treasury if grantees go on to raise further investment — making Private Nouns self-sustaining rather than perpetually dependent on auction revenue.

Context & Strategy

Public Nouns was founded to support public goods in the Ethereum ecosystem. Since its inception, however, the technological, financial, and political terrain surrounding open infrastructure has shifted significantly. The emergence of agentic software systems, widespread data extraction by platform monopolies, and growing public awareness of surveillance capitalism have redefined both the meaning and urgency of "public goods" in digital environments.

As Ethereum adoption becomes a given and the agentic web allows unprecedented access to app development, the cypherpunk thesis and the notion of public goods have never been more intertwined than today. Increasingly, open source is synonymous with values like privacy, data ownership, and cognitive sovereignty — against the surveillance, extraction, and algorithmic manipulation of the silicon valley products we call corposlop.

The best way to fund real public goods is to fight for cultural and market dominance of open source and cypherpunk values.

As Ethereum becomes a cultural schelling point for full-stack privacy and data sovereignty, our proposed strategy is to send "full stack" grants to organizations and actors across diverse cultural spaces, to be used for the hardware and consultation needed to implement private and data sovereign systems.

The initiative would:

• Build coalitional connections that position Ethereum as one component within a broader ethical and sovereign technology stack
• Introduce new cultural domains to open infrastructure
• Expand market awareness and demand for privacy-preserving tools
• Create reciprocal flows of attention and capital between external communities and Ethereum-aligned open-source ecosystems

Proposed Areas of Update

Below are some of the modernizations we look to deploy, though exact specifications will naturally follow from a deeply engaged resarch-oriented process.

Updates to the Brand and Investment Thesis

Rebrand from Public Nouns -> Private Nouns

Marks a transition from open-ended public goods to a tighter thesis around cypherpunk values.

Private Nouns: Supporting Full Stack Sovereignty

Our continued support for public goods would tighten into a grant thesis wherein public goods are proliferated and defended within cypherpuk values:

• individual autonomy
• strong privacy through technology
• anonymity by default
• expressive freedom
• distrust of centralized power

Further, technology alone does not fix our problems. We need these technologies to be well sustained by prolific usage in order to have well performing and viable alternatives to the corpo and state surveillance systems. So the grant thesis should support builders of open source privacy tech as well as supporting cultural frontiers that would expand its usage to diverse communities.

Desired proposals along the latter lines would expand the reach of the cypherpunk thesis to unlikely cultural spaces, especially non-web communities newly educated on the ubiquity and danger of corporate surveillance and data extraction. (In our experience, awareness of the problem and enthusiasm for solutions is saturating the culture far and wide.)

Capital Inflows

The auction model creates more friction than value. We will open up new funding mechanisms allowing both small and large capital injections. Donors receive an NFT as tokenized receipt — proof of support, plus access and governance rights proportionate to their contribution.

Convertible Grants

All grants should be viewed as convertible. While ROI is not explicitly expected, if a grantee project goes on to raise further investment, the grant converts into equity or funding rights that flow back to the treasury — sustaining further exploratory grants. This is the model that makes Private Nouns self-sustaining rather than perpetually dependent on auction revenue.

Governance & Infrastructure

All core social infrastructure remains the same. Current Public Noun holders retain their community access and governance rights. Future Private Noun holders receive governance proportionate to their donation. Our research process will uncover exactly how this is accomplished, and we'll outline the exact process before implementation. We will ensure any needed contract updates are handled as well and validated by third parties before deployment.

Artwork

New artwork shifts focus from specific organizations (whose missions may drift) to the permanent, unchanging values themselves. Holding and displaying a Private Noun signals support of these core values.

Technical Privacy

Can private nouns be held privately, only verified through zero knowledge proof of holding? Can we implement private voting, allowing signal to propagate free of coercion?

Who Would Private Nouns Attract?

Individuals and organizations with a vested interest in the widespread cultural adoption of cypherpunk-certified technologies will recognize that this initiative optimizes around a funding model that also functions as coalitional development and a go-to-market service for the industry. For orgs and individuals, support for PN can provide an answer to those asking the question: what have you done for the cypherpunk movement today?

The Ask

10 ETH from the Public Nouns treasury, deployed toward researching, developing and implementing a full plan of active modernization — beginning with the rebrand, capital inflow mechanisms, and an initial campaign outreach to attract new funders and grantees in line with the updated thesis.

The Team

This proposal will be executed by the Open Machine, in collaboration with the Public Nouns community and Raid Guild for technical support. The Open Machine is a cultural research studio founded by Ven Gist (original cofounder of public nouns) and Exeunt (event organizer and researcher involved with the Ethereum Localism movement). Visit The Open Machine for more about our work.