They had to have known about it for a while too.

So they sat and let the devs get it to a finished state only to pull this

Which is a fraction of a fraction of Android users.

I’m all for de Googling if that’s what tickles your fancy, but ask anyone on the street and they’ll have no idea what you’re talking about

Edit: This also allows Google to push some of these features to older devices which may not ever see another system update