When Google introduced its Chrome browser in the fall of 2008, I got an in-depth overview of the actual code. At the time, Google represented Chrome as a browser tied to the cloud and seemed to suggest that it was merely an advanced browser.

But as I pointed out in my column, ""Chrome's an OS, not a Browser,"" just after Chrome was released back in September of 2008, we discovered through the code review that this browser did something more then just connect to the Internet.
Indeed, we saw that it actually made direct calls to the computer's BIOS. I stated that Chrome was an actual operating system in the same way that Windows is, and that it could be used as an OS to control a PC.
The fact that it is an OS unto itself became even more obvious last week when many of us received our Chrome review laptops. My colleagues at PCMag.com have shared their thoughts about the Chrome OS and the Cr-48 notebook so I won't go into a review here. But I did want to share a couple of things about my experience with the machine and give you some initial industry feedback.
The laptop itself reminds me a lot of the Apple MacBook in design. But it's clearly not a Mac. When you boot it up, the Chrome browser comes up, and from that point on, this browser and the content you look up is all you'll see.
The browser's opening screen serves as your desktop view and all of the organizational navigation comes through browser tabs. When you type in the URL for YouTube, it becomes a tab. Type in another URL, and it comes up as a tab.
Using this UI strongly reinforces the fact that this is an OS/browser that is strictly tied to the Internet. It is not designed for any localized apps. It forces the users to a model where ubiquitous connectivity is mandatory for this laptop to even work.
However, there's another thing that's key to this machine's usability. It's completely tied to your Google Gmail account, or any other Google-related service for which you have an account, such as Google Voice, Picasa, or any Google app that requires registration. When the browser comes up at the start, you have to enter your personal Google account info and password for it to work. That means that you are driven through a Google view of the world, or, more specifically, its browser/apps world, just to make the computer work.
Now this begs an interesting question: Is this an open or closed system? Apple has been accused of having a closed system with its Mac, but in no way does it make a user register with an Apple ID just to launch a system. While it is true that once in a browser, a user can use any Web-based app or go to any Web-based site, at this point, you have to go through Google's Chrome browser to get there.
Do you see a pattern here? To use the Chrome OS on a PC system, you basically have to buy into the idea that Google has the right to deliver its ads, messages, and even apps to you as part of the Chrome experience.
Google has the capability of following a lot of your moves. Sure, they're supposed to be anonymous, but Google can re-sell your info to advertisers in the form of trend data and ad pushes. I suspect that when people really understand the encompassing nature of the Chrome OS, the issue of privacy and Google's intent will become even more pronounced.
(Source: PC Magazine)