How hard would it be for Google to make a cross-manufacturer protocol that could take advantage of this huge scale of Android to provide a better coverage AirTag that works independently from having a Samsung, a Pixel, an Oppo, etc ... specific products.
Without the scale, your Android devices may be the only devices in your area listening for "Tags" which isn't bad if you are trying to find your keys at your house, but makes it difficult to track your luggage with airlines or monitor where your kids may be. Of course, the flip side of this scale is the current malicious use of AirTags for stalking & harrassment.
What solutions are there to this problem? Asking Google to recreate AirTags is simply recreating the problem within a second ecosystem. Perhaps this is an example of how lack of scale can be a 'good' thing from certain perspectives (a philosophical debate on the tipping point of your product shifting from consumer good to community harm). If you have honest conversations with lawyers or Risk Management, you'd know that passing laws against misuse has no effect unless a law is enforceable.
We're back at the core of the question, AirTags being only one example. How does society navigate the use of helpful technologies for malicious purposes.
I guess they are more afraid of the political consequences since only one "entity" can hold the global AATag data: Killing off their Android partners business (Samsung et al.), beeing accused you acquiring/building yet another data pool -> Potential Anti Trust issues.
Potentially they could work around some of those issues by creating some kind of non-profit and independent 501c (is that the correct US term?) organization that holds the data and endows it with enough money that it can stay independent.
But does Google want this kind of headache and spend the money?
It's more likely that Google is astonishingly bad at product development and doesn't need new OS features for Android to compete for marketshare. People don't buy iPhones for AirTag features.
Don’t they? I don’t think AirTag support is a “must have” feature for many smartphone buyers, but I can see it being a factor that makes a buying choice go the iPhone way.
I also can see AirTags being a factor in keeping an iPhone user an iPhone user, especially for users that have many AirTags.