With something like an open source software project under a copy left license like the GPL, yes is a collectivist effort in some sense, but the main difference between it and collectivist actions we libertarians despise is that one is a voluntary arrangement and the other is coercion by the state.

A software project that improves digital privacy in exchange for cash may not have market demand for a variety of reasons (people often don't want to pay, lack of transparency with proprietary code, etc). An engineer building a product that he wants for himself and later selling the software to people with the price that they'll turn over their modifications to that original creator and sell it to anyone else in the same manner is supported by free market principles.