If ChromeOS is the Linux Desktop of 2021, it surely represents the antithesis of open source ideals? ChromeOS is a cloud operating system (OS) that tracks and

If ChromeOS is the Linux Desktop of 2021, it surely represents the antithesis of open source ideals? ChromeOS is a cloud operating system (OS) that tracks and records all your activity the moment you sign in. Naturally, a Google account is required to use the full functionality of the OS. It is used by millions of schoolkids with all the privacy implications that entails. Somehow, Google's promise to never build profiles of their school users is enough to placate developers. In fact, developers are more likely to defend Google rather than question or scrutinise the privacy implications of using a cloud OS. I presume most developers are happy to sign-in in an OS to unlock OS functionality and have their activity tracked? After all, we've happy to push this model on kids. It's ironic that so much cloud software, whether an OS or a SaaS product, is built on open source software. And yet cloud software gives users less control and more tracking than the desktop model. Cloud software has been open source's greatest success - just not in the way open source advocates expected it to be.