i will just say that Firefox OS cannot arrive quickly enough.
I think the pining for FirefoxOS is only meaningful if Mozilla takes a stand on privacy or the like. And they're not in a strong position to do so.
ideally, i would like to hook and script a conditional firewall of sorts between any apps and my hardware or data. for example, i dont want any app querying my location when i am at home or at work. how awesome would it be to set rules like this?
some invasive permissions are ok when i choose to allow them, but not indefinitely so long as the app lives on my phone, which is the situation right now. i can do a lot of quasi-scripting with Tasker for android, but not nearly enough.
18% of internet users use firefox. thats a lot of eyeballs google would be missing out on without the search deal in place. they gets much more out of that arrangement than mozilla does to have any leverage. MS would be equally happy to pay mozilla for that 18%. moz can easily find many other avenues to make money while goog cannot find an extra 18% user base elsewhere.