Google Chrome OS--Will it be able to Replace Windows?

Google announced yesterday that they are going to introduce an open-source, light weighted Operating System "Google Chrome OS" into the market in second half of 2010. Their first target is consumers who use netbooks.

This is an exciting news, though I'm not surprised at all. It seems a nature step of evolution of cloud computing.

Yes, when the OS was first invented, people did not know much about web, and how powerful the web could be. So the OS was designed as a set of programs that can management and support applications running on our local computer, such as text editor, calculator, spreadsheet etc. Later, the internet came into our life. A browser appeared in our PC desktop, searching and reading news from browser, writing and checking email become more and more important way for us to keep contact with the world. Now, it seems we can find the corresponding web services to provide the desktop application functionality that we use everyday. So, is it the time to move to the web, completely? Is it a time that we no longer worry about virus, malware, and security, as Google announced?

I don't think so. Yes, it is a unavoidable trend to move to web. But, moving to web will cause new security concerns. Say, do you know if your data files stored safely on the web? Who can access them? While I'm transferring my files to internet, who else can see them besides me? Will there be some new types of malware be created to infect the data center storing the data?

I believe that not everyone would feel happy and unconditionally trust the web services to take care of their data. And not everyone would be satisfy the services and functionality provided through web. Like people have different tastes on economical or luxury cars, people have different tastes and concerns when they selecting their computers. So, I think the future personal computer market may split to two levels: one is super cheap, and super simple netbook market for students and general users; the other one would be high end, powerful, cool, expensive, highly personalized personal computers for geeks.