Android's openness has made it to those who want the openness. The fact that my phone OS is open is the thing I care about.
(I'm running SkyRaider 3.3 on my HTC Incredible on Verizon.)
(Not that people won't figure out ways around them, but if Android were truly open to users you wouldn't need exploits to get around limitations...)
The blame should rest entirely with the carriers.
This isn't "Apple vs Android" this is "Apple vs Carriers".
That's an academic distinction, though, wouldn't you agree? Android as software is perhaps "truly open" but what about Android as a user experience?
Android, from the perspective of the vast majority of people who will interact with it, is what the carriers say it is.
The fact that there are multiple suppliers give the user choice. They can include how locked down a phone is in their criteria for making that choice, and buy one direct if they wish to have a phone that's not locked down by a middleman.
That phone is not publicly available unless you're a dev.
http://shop.vodafone.co.uk/shop/mobile-phone/google-nexus-on...
http://www.expansys.com/google-nexus-one-android-smartphone-...
I do know a lot more people that have extended both iOS and Android using the developer API's, so all the evidence I see is that even technical users don't care about RMS's "freedoms", except the one to extend the software running on their devices, and the market response indicates all many care about the "integrated system" Steve wants to focus on, even when AT&T service sucks ass (just today, I got two voicemails without the phone ringing (granted, this is in NYC)).
(disclaimer: everything stated is my own opinion, not representative of employers past or present, etc.)
I don't think you appreciate how restrictive that is. The only example of open hardware is the Yeelong, since that's what Stallman uses. The only open source distro is gNewsense, etc.