Well my Chrome folder in C:\Users\simon\AppData\Local\Google is 1.66GB, the application being 323MB of it, so I suppose its a bit of a space hog.

But I don't see the problem with large memory use. Ideally, all of your memory should be put to use all of the time, otherwise it is wasted, no? Shouldn't we be complaining that browsers aren't using more of our 4,6,8,12,16 gigs of RAM?