Communicating with external devices via USB or the old D-Sub connectors.

Printers, microcontrollers, instruments, etc... Directly instead of through the OS.

Notably, ESPHome Programmer uses it for flashing ESP32s wired. Other companies like Solo Motor Controllers use it for delivering a user GUI to customers that is always updated but that can switch between versions instantly for production without having to having to deal with window's broken method of having to manually search and download .exes for every program.

Even grapheneOS use it for adb into your phone to flash the images.

“Coming soon…”

I heard about the web usb thing, it's also going to be a game changer for me (I haven't tried yet, hopefully it works)

because theres no fighting google.

Microsoft tried, and google won, which is why Edge became a chrome reskin instead of what it was before.

Pale Moon is not a soft fork.

Vivaldi have earned and deserve a lot of trust here I believe. All my chromium eggs sit in their basket.

Aye, I'm just not sure how it's going to play out. One can hope, though. It's definitely one of the best options Chrome-wise either way.

It's not an ecosystem of one, though one is very dominant.

You can compare it to Linux. It's not the only Unix-like kernel, but it's similarly dominant. If you want to create a new distribution, it doesn't make any sense to spend a decade trying to write your own kernel rather than just using the Linux kernel (insert GNU Hurd jokes here).

Is that an unhealthy ecosystem then? I don't think it is.

What makes the chromium situation unhealthy is Google's ownership and control, not that it's the preferred engine for other browsers. I mean, even a company as large as Microsoft gave up trying to create their own engine.