Thanks for the well-reasoned post, Tom, and I agree with you here.

I suspected from the beginning that the carriers might do something to these phones, but hoped they wouldn't or at least that there would be an alternative. Clearly things haven't turned out as I'd hoped. The problem as I see it is not that the OS is open, but that the carriers are making it closed.

I have one wish for Google when it comes to this issue: that they declare that if a carrier or manufacturer wants to use Android, they have to give they users the option of using the stock OS. It could be when the user first turns on the phone, or just a settings screen. But somehow, Google needs to give people the option of using the regular OS.

I've disagreed all along with the people who thought that the OS version fragmentation was an issue. I still don't think it is, because at least with every version of the OS there's some consistency, and while you may not have all the features with older versions, you still have a decent user experience.

But I completely agree that this skinning issue is a big problem. So far, I'm disappointed that Google hasn't said word one about it.