Minimize sustaining energy

As stated before, entropy is the tendency of a system to progress from order towards randomness. To fight this tendency towards disorder, a good system architecture should aim to reduce the energy required to sustain the system. Energy here means all types of energy, including physical energy, human effort, or systemic energy. Any form of “entropy fighting” is considered energy output, and a good system minimizes the amount of energy input required.

An example of this would be two different systems, one that uses market forces to achieve its outcome versus one that uses government regulation. All else being equal, the one that uses market forces is a better architecture, because it uses the existing energy flow of the market to fuel its system rather than requiring the input of energy that is required by regulation.