I am not sure if that future, where everything is tracked and sold for Google ads - and with Chinese weird mix of capitalism and authoritarianism - is better than Apple-made future, but that's for another debate.
How right you are! The Google Nexus lines were originally industry leaders, signalling the next minimum feature set and specs for Android phones with the added benefit of unadulterated (carrier cruft free) Android releases on the fastest release cycle.
Now vendors are far exceeding specs found on Nexus phones and even the rumored Pixel phones; the next Asus phone[1] has 6 GB of system memory versus Marlin's rumored 4 GB, and the Asus phone has expandable memory^H^H^H^H storage to boot which is something Google eschews on their devices.
So consumers are really down to rolling the dice on timeliness of vendor OS releases - do you risk a nicer phone that is potentially rarely, slowly or never updated or take a middle-of-the-road phone from Google that'll have regular security patches and OS releases for 18 months?
It's no wonder people root their phones and run Cyanogen so they can have the best of both worlds.
[1]
http://www.gsmarena.com/snapdragon_821powered_asus_zenfone_3...
Yes. I bought Chinese smartphone for 130 euros few weeks ago and I can't feel much difference from premium Android phones. Sure, camera is not so clear, touchscreen lags sometimes, but it's acceptable for my use case and the fact that it's 3-4 cheaper than a brand phone with same/similar spec.
My first foray into Chinese phones was the OnePlus One which I was more than happy with (still am), I then bought a cheap Doogee X5 for about €50 to use on my commute, which was OK for such a cheap phone, camera was rubbish but I never used it and the GPS tracking and 4g that I did use was perfect for my use case.
I see it's out of stock now and price have increased slightly. BTW, its screen is surprisingly good.
It's in the inability for the OS to be kept up to date so security patches aren't always forthcoming.