This week it was announced that Google will begin leasing Chrome OS laptop computers to students for $20/month. This decision is an absolute game changer, as it completely eliminates the personal ownership of hardware. If future computer users no longer own any hardware and they are working exclusively with cloud-based software, the world of computing will have been reinvented and Google will be at the center.

The model we are all used to is entirely built on ownership. 1. You plop down money for a computer. 2. You customize it with your own settings, applications, and accessories. 3. You use the computer to do stuff, make stuff, communicate, and consume content. Step one of this model sucks, and it’s about to be eliminated.

Imagine a world where you simply pay a subscription fee and you always have a computer that works. When it breaks, you simply swap it for a working one. When a new model comes out, you simply trade yours in for the new one. When you travel, you simply login to a computer in the bus station, on the airplane, in the hotel, or where ever else you find yourself, and all of your files, settings, and applications are right where you left them. This level of convenience and ease-of-use is the dream of true cloud computing, and Google is now delivering this dream for a mere twenty bucks a month.

If you’re passionate about the environment, there’s even more reasons to love this cloud-lease model. When computer manufacturers sell you a new computer, you own it and it’s your responsibility to deal with it when its time to discard it. Once this responsibility is transferred from the end user to the manufacturer, there are huge incentives to design computer systems that are more sustainable. Not only is it costly for a huge company to discard toxic materials like mercury and pvc, but there can be huge cost savings in designing equipment that is upgradable or has re-usable components. Once a company can save money going green, there’s no reason not to do it.

Unfortunately, the move towards hardware-independent cloud computing is not a good thing for computer companies like Apple, HP, and Dell (unless they move to the same model, too). These companies want you to want your own computer and want you to upgrade as much as possible. Once your computing experience is entirely about software and you don’t care what physical device you happen to use to gain access, computer makers have been cut out of the loop. In the event that Google’s Chrome Laptop lease program is a success, you can bet that other big names will follow suit and push out their own computer leasing programs.

At the core of Google’s plan is a shift in values. Google is betting that computer users are going to leave behind the notion of computers as objects, and instead view computers as mere portals to the real product: the content on the cloud.