Not only can you not read, but completely missed the point.
Apples system is closed compared to Android, but it is open compared to what came before, for most phones. The carriers would lock down handsets so they couldn't use bluetooth, couldn't download ringtones except from the carrier, couldn't plug into your computer. They would not start selling a phone unless it conformed to what they wanted it to do.
I'll be voted down for this on HN, but unforunately Android is reversing a lot of this progress. Buy the average Android handset and it has all sorts of stupid carrier modifications that no end-user would ever have requested. It's like the crap-ware that PCs have installed with them straight from the factory, except that you have to do a lot more work to get rid of it.
The iPhone is free of this because Apple's success let them give AT&T the finger when it came to carrier modifications. As the iPhone loses ground to Android in the market, expect the pressure on Apple to mount. Would Apple ever have an AT&T splash screen on the iPhone? They sure wouldn't want to, but if that's the only way to keep the iPhone on the market, it'll happen. Who knows how much further it'll go...
"The people griping about Apple’s “closed system” are generally people who are new to the industry and didn’t realize how bad it was before."