HN to Chrome OS: “you can’t run Skype”!

If you haven’t already please check out this HN post and the corresponding coverage by Techcrunch of Google’s new Chrome OS here.

In what could be hailed as one of the most significant developments in the tech industry for some time, an open source Google OS, the top comment on the HN post complains that “you can’t run Skype” or other instant messengers natively on a Chrome OS device..

Other commenters compared it to Steve Jobs talking about web apps running on the iPhone.. Wha????

Of course I commented, making a dumb terminals and mainframe analogy. I also brought up the potential effects on Microsoft. Yeah, that netted me -1 points. Go figure.

What was frightening was that there really wasn’t, as of this writing, much of a discussion at all – hardly anything about its effects on the industry or the significance of the event. Odd that Microsoft and Windows were hardly mentioned… Microsoft and the future of the web at large were the 800 pound gorillas in the room but somehow those facts remained invisible..  This is Google OS people..! Does it have to be spelled out?

Here we go:

1. Google is one of the 3 most influential software/tech companies on planet Earth. Apple and Microsoft being the other 2.
2. Laptops are the new desktops, Netbooks are the new laptops, and the Internet is almost everywhere.
3. The browser IS the most important app on your PC or Mac.
4. Web apps are the future.
5. When Saleforce uses a buzzword like ‘cloud computing’ I want to throw up. When Google says it, I believe them. This is the real McCoy and probably the closest yet we’ve come to a major push for actual grid computing.. Is that not significant?
6. Devices that boot directly into the ‘network’ which has more access to your GPU..? Sweet!

In short: Grid computing just got real – so it would be nice if we could have a real discussion about it…

Don’t believe me..? Checkout out the Techcrunch comments, all 178 of them as of now, and do a side by side.

2 Responses to “HN to Chrome OS: “you can’t run Skype”!”

1. Tweets that mention HN to Chrome OS: “you can’t run Skype”! | teaBUZZED -- Topsy.com says:

   November 20, 2009 at 12:20 am

   [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Web Startup Group, hrjn_rss. hrjn_rss said: HN to Chrome OS: “you can’t run Skype”: Comments http://url4.eu/nEJW [...]

   Reply
2. boxoft says:

   November 20, 2009 at 3:58 am

   Many software (and webware) has an iPhone version. It’s easier to develop a Chrome version because it’s a web app (webware). The hard part is security and the risk that Google may abuse users data someday.

   Reply