JBQ redeemed: https://www.greenbot.com/jbq-is-quitting-aosp/ (yes, 2013)

I regret having wasted a good part of my career supporting Google with the Android enterprise. They had some very good (technically and intentionally) people there, but it all got thoroughly corrupted.

With hindsight the only thing that kept them remotely honest was the Andy Rubin vs Sundar Pichai turf war, which at the time manifested as Android vs Chrome. Once that had a decided winner it was a recipe for serious trouble.

The only viable way forward for an open mobile OS is to fork Android as is. This is the only way to carry over anything resembling existing app support or all the work that goes into making a mobile OS actually work up to the level users expect. i.e. cameras through to hardware media CODECs and total system stability.