> The only companies that should be allowed to buy Chrome are non-profits and companies promising to sell it for a fee (preferably not a subscription).
I am not sure if a single fee works. Browsers are too important and hard to maintain. What if people had paid single fee for Chrome 15 years ago for non-profit?
I don't think that it works with browsers. Otherwise web standards will not progress very well, since everyone tries to support the first Chrome version for their website. We create even more friction than having different browsers already has.
My take is the reverse. It would slow down development of web standard, which is a good thing, and allow competitors to develop and catch up.
We want more browser engines, and slowing down development, e.g. to yearly, every two, or every three year for major releases would go a long way to ensure that.
> We want more browser engines, and slowing down development, e.g. to yearly, every two, or every three year for major releases would go a long way to ensure that.
Maybe you forget why we want more browser engines? It is not that we want the same standards rewritten differently. We want more competition, so that we get new ideas and alternatives. Maybe others don't have to catch up, since some standards or practices are currently dictated by Google and not seen as good in general.
It's not a profitable business to be in, and Perplexity would just do the exact same thing that might force Google to sell Chrome.
The only companies that should be allowed to buy Chrome are non-profits and companies promising to sell it for a fee (preferably not a subscription).