So, they are starting to transition even bigger applications to their snap format. How long before most of software packaged for Ubuntu ends up as snap?Ubuntu developer Olivier Tilloy mentioned that the transition from deb to snap is not being debated though, as it's "a firm plan that will eventually save a lot of engineering, builder and maintenance resources by removing the need to build every new version of chromium on all supported Ubuntu releases".
Are they preparing for potential breakaway from Debian at some point in the future?
Sure, Chromium is a big program and hard to compile, I get that. But look at Debian! For how many archs does Debian package Chromium? And all of it spread across 3 branches.
I think Ubuntu devs are getting lazy and too invested in their own little projects. THe gap between them and the rest of the free software community is becoming wider every year.