Flutter has similar tradeoffs as other cross platform tech such as React Native. Its great for simple apps that don't need platform specific UI or services.
Google can only do so many things. Every avenue needs to have a significant impact. Google is also a SV echo chamber. They have a lot of blind spots. Lots of room for smaller startups to carve a niche. After get large enough to get Google's full competitive attention another story.
Interesting. I recently swapped desktop from Windows to Linux because of the instability from updates. I have a macbook pro I also use which is generally faster and more stable.