01.23.21

Chromium and Chrome Are Not Free Software But an Example of Microsoft-Fashioned Openwashing Tactics

Posted in Deception, DRM, Free/Libre Software, Google, Microsoft, Patents at 12:02 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: It’s time to reject Google’s Web monopoly (shared with other companies but still an oligopoly); removing its Web browser would be a good start

SOME people seem a little shocked that not only Chrome but also Chromium is a listening device (or “app”). Google didn’t create such a browser out of altruism or goodwill. It’s just an instrument of control — a piece of software that merely leverages Free software to develop something proprietary cheaply and quickly (while doing the minimum towards licence compliance), i.e. another Android or Chrome OS. Google has been trying to replace the underlying toolchain with something that’s not GPL (copyleft), but without success, at least not so far. The compiler, the kernel and so on are still Free-as-in-freedom software. The thing that sit on top is not. Mr. Torvalds and the Linux Foundation are fine with it. Serves them well enough (attracting many paying members that don’t necessarily contribute to software freedom in any way) because it fattens the budget irrespective of agenda/objective..

Bird on Ropes The above video deals with the patent trap that Chrome fast becomes whilst limiting people’s ability to remove antifeatures (there will be consequences or retaliation). As a prominent Slackware developer, who compiles (or packages) the Web browser himself, put it [1, 2]: “Google muzzles all Chromium browsers on 15 March 2021″ and “Chromium 88 removes Flash support,” (as mentioned in the media) albeit it leaves us all with EME/DRM instead.

It’s probably perfectly fair to say that Chrome (and Chromium) is about monopoly and monoculture, not freedom. The Web is becoming increasingly bloated, not for the sake of users but for the benefit of surveillance, which begets social control (class war). We really need to convince GNU/Linux users to gradually get away from Chrome and Chromium (the “lesser evil”). █

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