I think we're moving towards unlocked phones. Both HTC and Samsung have sent signals that they want to open up their phones. And then we're talking about drivers and specifications. Everything that can get them one step ahead of Apple. Also, it seem to be deemed "cool" to be open, so they might just spin it to marketing.
Sadly I don't know if this will be the case for US, where the operators have way too much control over the devices. Luckily I live in Europe, outside of EU. :-)