The updates thing doesn't really bother me much honestly, although granted I didn't really feel the need to get the latest and shiniest iOS updates either, always waited until the bugs were ironed out, because there were always some.
The nice thing about assistant over talkback though... assistant has the magic tap gesture too like VO does.
Also a largely pointless thing, but glad my phone started on android 7, just for android neko which unfortunately was removed for 8, and the new easter egg isn't even all that cool.