> I don't know what's inherently so bad about "being a google user".
Having every facet of your digital life mined for personal data, for the sake of a mega-corp's bottom line?
> If the only hypothetical disadvantage you're thinking about it is "Google might shut down one day"
Not at all. Its actually more likely "Google might stop supporting X, Y or Z that you depend on".. They, you know, have a history of doing that.
However, let's play along anyway.
> If the TV channels shut down tomorrow, your TVs effectively stop working too, you still buy them.
No. Just. No. I literally don't remember the last time I watched broadcast television (hotels excepted), even when I lived in a country where I could understand what was being said on the broadcast channels. In our last house 1 of 2 TV's was connected to a satellite receiver for when my father in law was in the house. We moved 3-4 months ago. No satellite dish hooked up yet. No terrestrial aerial.
> There are hundreds of such devices out there, which you buy because it's pretty evident the company is not shutting down tomorrow.
I do? Would you care to enlighten me about these devices I apparently buy?
> On the other hand, even if Google shuts down, a lot of things on your Chromebook will keep on working offline
Are you kidding me? In offline-mode, you can't even edit your calendar on a Chromebook.
You're also not thinking about things like e.g. users on the system. It's inherently dependent on Google - you can't just add a local account like you can with a regular computer, you have to be online, with the person sitting there next to you, so they can sign in with their own google account.
> especially with the advent of Android apps now
Right, because apps designed to work on a mobile phone, which generally has it's own data connection independent of whether wifi is available or not, will just naturally assume they need to work offline. Good luck with that.