Ok, this isn't so much an optimistic take, but rather a possible way this could be a good thing:
Granted, this looks a lot like Sony's past ill-conceived plan of rolling out spin-off films no one cared about but the one key difference so far: no Aunt May and no Sinister Six, the latter we definitely know was in production and would have come out if this Marvel deal didn't go through. I think that means there is another plan in place.
The way I see it, Spider-Man has a big rogue gallery, probably the biggest rogue gallery of recognizable villains in the Marvel Universe, so biggest way to leverage that is to focus on the villains. Sony wants to leverage the Spider-Man brand (and will, whether we like it or not) and that means that their options start getting pretty limited if they do it in a traditional sense by focusing on the heroes. That would mean they only have the choice of making everything Peter/Holland centric, have a separate animated universe (which they are doing), inundate us with "Spider____" leads (which is cool seeing those other Spider-persons on film for the first time but can get redundant in their stories and/or begin to lessen Peter's significance), or try to spin-off smaller status "heroes" such as an Aunt May film or trying to make anti-heroes the leads. I think there is various room for all those ideas in the long run, but as the main driving force for a franchise and to serve as the backbone of everything, it ultimately needs to revolve around Peter in a way the MCU or DCEU doesn't have to.
Personally, I would liked to have seen Spider-Man Homecoming and it's sequels be sowing the seeds for spin-offs, but ultimately everything would still tie back into the Spider-Man films where the biggest story beats can be (such as the inevitable Sinister Six crossover). They still might do that but I think they might get there a different way than I expected.
The drawback with making everything Peter-centric, on a pure logistical perspective is that Holland himself can only devote his time to so many projects in a year. Realistically there is only room for one full-time Spider-Man film a year and even that is probably pushing it on a production level, since right now Holland is working on more than one Spider-Man role at a time in a year (Infinity War and Homecoming atm) but the Homecoming sequel is at least a couple years away and Sony want other Spider-Man films now. Not only that, but if you take the Burton/Schumacher Batman formula (the one that laid the ground for how many superhero films approach villain, in my eyes) you get one or two major villains at most in a film, and that means it take a long damn time to see your favorite villains face off Spider-Man at best or you get crap crammed in like ASM2 and SM3 at worst, as they are anxious to get to the next big thing. This is where I think a different approach could help Sony and Marvel work around this issue.
As we all know, the MCU mostly likes to focus on the heroes and their story over the villains, much to the dismay of the fans. This may help for creating a compelling story of developing the heroes and their narrative, but it often marginalizes new antagonist characters. The opposite take, which, again, I think has roots that go back to the Batman films, has a focus on the villains, and especially in the case of Nolan's Batman, I think it can lead to the villains getting more of the narrative focus than the hero. But what if by Sony focusing on the villain's stories, it's a way to not try to simply make villains ambiguously aligned or turn them into heroes/anti-heroes with their own wacky adventures, it's a away to create a Spider-Man story that doesn't have to rely on trying to be about Spider-Man, but rather can be narratively about these other characters, whether good or bad. It also doesn't have to make ever villain have to be a good guy in a sense or redeemable. They can be fleshed out and made relatable, but they don't have to be changed to fit the format of what people expect of a film, that being that the star is the protagonist.
This approach would already have a precedent in the MCU since that seems to be the way they are doing Infinity War since we've gotten reports that Thanos will be the main character, in essence, and while that makes sense logistically since balance an ensemble cast of so many heroes would be a nightmare, it also gives Thanos a chance to get a backstory and get the bulk of the development and motivation for the story. With regards to Sony, this means they can give Venom or Black Cat and Silver Sable the build up they deserve (that is more difficult to do in a Spider-Man film), they can do it quicker than they would be able to in a Spider-Man film, and they don't have to change the characters if they don't want to. That means, we don't necessarily have to get an anti-hero Venom (though I think that is what we get, mostly) but they could still have Holland come in for a minor role to have to clash with Venom, and not necessarily just to work with him. That means Holland can have a range of involvement in various Sony films throughout a year as Spider-Man, but the Sony Marvel Universe still gets to remain Spider-Man-centric while also avoiding any potential pitfalls of spin-offs or attempting to do too much and under-utilizing/watering down any characters.
My conclusion is that I think this gives Sony and opportunity to flesh out their side of the Universe, while giving us lots of Spider-Man, while having lots of spin-off films, and without having to take away anything from anyone to make it happen. This also allows for completely standalone films that may or may not tie in to the overall Spider-Man canon in the future, but it at least would be a set up that doesn't step on anyone's toes, while allowing them to leverage the strengths of a connected universe, in the same way Marvel Studios does by themselves. Then if Sony builds up things properly and works with Marvel, you know, maybe they can do stuff like build up Jessica Drew to put her in the MCU proper or Flash Thompson to be Agent Venom in the GotG.
I mean, here is some food for thought: a Kingpin film starring Vincent D'Onofrio building off of his Daredevil stuff featuring Spider-Man and Daredevil. There would only be a slim chance I see Kingpin being one of Spider-Man's villains in a main film, since there are so many other options that make for better cinema and otherwise his role can get a little cluttered, but if you make a film with Kingpin and maybe another villain, suddenly you get to build on a character who has already been fleshed out with a world that is fleshed out and you can basically do a Daredevil/Spider-Man crossover without having to devote a whole Spider-Man film to that cool side story. Basically, it makes possible something that seems very unlikely otherwise. Another thing this approach can do that Sony would have failed at doing with ASM before: giving a proper Sinister Six build up, Avengers-style across multiple films, except without having to shoehorn things into a Spider-Man film to rush things along or throw them into their own film just to get them out there, and without having to turn them into anti-heroes. Think of all the lack of build up that would happen with SM's villains even if they were a focus of a film, how many villains like Osborn who would be better to slowly develop in the background or how rushed Venom's origin is portrayed in SM3. You make Peter sort of like Thanos tying every character in Sony's universe together, and they can develop their own stories in their own films before coming together in various ways, except instead of Peter being a big bad, he is the lynchpin that is trying to tackle this mounting group of evil-doers and various characters with their own agendas.
