ChromeBooks haven’t been the runaway success Google thought them to be. But that isn’t going to deter Mozilla from releasing its own flavor of instant-on cloud OS. The Firefox maker has decided to build its own OS for mobile devices to challenge rival Google. Keep reading to know why its a really really bad idea.

Google has come through with its official release of Chromebooks from partners Samsung and Acer. The WiFi-only and 3G variants of the new Acer Chromia and Samsung Series 5 Chromebooks are available to order online by US customers from Amazon and BestBuy.com, starting at $379.99 and $429.99, respectively.

Google I/O day two belonged to Google Chrome. We saw what Chrome was going towards with its fast paced development cycle and a new way of personal computing with the Chrome OS, which has been much polished since we last used it. Also announced were the Google Chromebooks, keep reading past the break  to know what these are.

Google is already working towards a tablet future for Chrome OS. Although Chrome OS is not yet available outside of CR-48 laptops, changes in the source code of Chrome OS show  a virtual keyboard, an “optimized for touch” interface, and more. Though the company never said it wouldn’t use Chrome OS on tablets, up until now it seemed as though it was deemed for the dying netbook market. The changes were noticed first by CNET. Keep reading for Google’s response to the query.

Originally announced with a planned second half of 2010 launch, today Google has narrowed the launch of its Chrome OS to fall. This, according to Sundar Pichai, Google VP of product management speaking at Computex. By our calculation that is sometime between 22 September and 21 December in the northern hemisphere if you want to take the man literally… and you do, don’t you. Wonder if we’ll see a Chrome OS tablet launch at the same time?

It’s been hard to take that view of Google too seriously since most of the computers they do their work on likely run Windows. In the near future though, that may not be the case. A new report tonight in the Financial Times suggests that Google is steering its employees away from using Microsoft’s dominant operating system in the workplace. In fact, the reports says that, “New hires are now given the option of using Apple’s Mac computers or PCs running the Linux operating system.” And it states that getting a computer running Windows may require permission as high up as Google’s CIO.

We’re sure Google will be downplaying this news within the next few days, but this truly does raise a few more questions. The strategy that Google is going to move forward with wrt the development on both Windows and other platforms.