Can you elaborate on that? Many Android phones can have their bootloader unlocked, allow installing alternate operating systems, have alternate app stores, and allow sideloading of applications.
This is of course scoped to here in the US, where most of the time Android phones have their OS entirely locked down apart from sideloading apps, ie no running different ROMs, upgrading out of what you're allowed by the network, rooting, running super user apps, etc