You spent more time typing that out than it would have taken to actually check Google's wording. They claim "7 years of OS updates", you're just spreading misinformation.
Don't worry, it's probably going to be even more locked down.
I miss Android 7 and prior. The only improvement I see is permission management and UI on tablets (dp >= 600). And perhaps app updates without prompting user from 3rd party app stores (like F-Droid), but I don't like automatic updates anyway.