To hazard a guess: the higher-ups at Google think (know?) that the future lies in the open web. Android is a stopgap to compete in the current mobile environmen

To hazard a guess: the higher-ups at Google think (know?) that the future lies in the open web. Android is a stopgap to compete in the current mobile environment, but I'm hoping ChromeOS displaces Android entirely in the next 3-5 years. WebOS started down that path, and Mozilla is really doing it right with B2G. I think Google realizes the same. This transition can't happen suddenly. Google may also be waiting for the rest of the mom-and-pop web to catch up with the capabilities of native apps (via WebRTC, WebGL, etc) without having to depend so much on extensions, NaCl plugins and the like. At that point, ChromeOS will "just work" for rich applications alongside the rest of the web, which neatly sidesteps any fragmentation issues.