Taking 10 steps in the direction of evil, and taking 1 step back, is not something that should save you from the gallows.

Especially when they're continuing on the next 10 steps ASAP.

So they can be less evil to more people rather than pushing people to a non-evil platform.

What is the non-evil phone platform? Aftermarket Android ROMs?

If they had gone ahead and blocked local installs, and forced every apk to be signed by a registered developer, I'm assuming there would have been a strong push for a viable Linux on these devices.

Sadly, less evil is still evil.