Exactly this. There’s no nefarious motive to doing this, because Amazon can already do everything nefarious that they want to do with their current Android-based Fire OS.
I’m actually willing to take Amazon’s reasoning at face value for this. They say that Android is too heavyweight and inflexible for embedded IoT devices, and that they want to build something lighter. This makes plenty of sense, and is indeed something that Google themselves have also said as justification for their move to Fuschia for their own embedded devices.
For Linux fans, it’s probably a good thing that Amazon has chosen another Linux-based architecture rather than doing as Google are doing and moving off Linux to a different kernel.
Android is already free software, and see how far that gets you. The kicker is that you’re tied into their services (with all the data harvesting, targeted advertising and monetisation that that involves).
The GNOME Foundation is thrilled to announce the GNOME project is receiving €1M from the Sovereign Tech Fund to modernize the platform, improve tooling and accessibility, and support features that are in the public interest....
Amazon Building its Own Linux-Based OS to Replace Android (www.omgubuntu.co.uk)
GNOME Recognized as Public Interest Infrastructure (foundation.gnome.org)
The GNOME Foundation is thrilled to announce the GNOME project is receiving €1M from the Sovereign Tech Fund to modernize the platform, improve tooling and accessibility, and support features that are in the public interest....