Actually I think the limitations on this device are a good thing, AS LONG AS there is the 'developer switch'. I don't want the normal user to have any kind of

Actually I think the limitations on this device are a good thing, AS LONG AS there is the 'developer switch'. I don't want the normal user to have any kind of root access to their machine - and actually most users don't want it either! With power comes responsibility, and non-tech people don't want responsibility with their laptop - they just want it to work. As long as there's a switch on the back to drop me to a proper bash prompt, and as long as I can tell whomever I support/recommend this laptop for "don't ever touch this" and it will continue to work for them, this is only a good thing. If you know that the user will never be doing rooty things like installing software, you can put a lot of extra security on a device without compromising the user experience, and the Chromebook does exactly this. Better security, easier user experience, and as-in-speech freedom is one switch away if you want the responsibility. Honestly, I don't see the down side.