Apple, and anyone else locking devices are relying on the threat of criminal penalties.
As they say on Wikipedia: "citation needed". Last I checked Apple hadn't bothered going after anyone who'd unlocked their phone, or even anyone who'd distributed tools for unlocking phones. Also, it's questionable that the law would even support that -- there's a DMCA exemption for cell-phone unlocking, for example, which means the only likely grounds for going after someone would be civil proceedings based on breach of user agreements.
Which means that, um, you're spouting off a bunch of hyperbole unrelated to actual reality.
I live in a reality where I can read public U.S. documents.
Here's one where Apple requests to keep it a criminal act to unlock an iPhone:
"Apple Inc. submits this responsive comment in opposition to proposed Class #1 contained in
proposed exemptions labeled 5A and 11A3 submitted by the Electronic Frontier Foundation"
To date, it is legal for an "individual" to unlock their phone (an iPhone's additional behavior, not so certain) but it is still a criminal act to provide services or create tools to assist such acts. The fact that the government isn't currently prosecuting does not make the threat any more real. The threat keeps the unlocking market from being legitimate and pervasive. The current Copyright Office exemption only applies to a narrow range of activity leaving wholesale unlocking a gray/black market.
You can see the most recent EFF request is September, 2009. It seems pretty clear the status of jailbreaking is still up in the air.
It took me one Google search to find dozens of quality sources of information on this topic. Next time, please do your own search before publicly accusing someone of being disconnected from reality.
As they say on Wikipedia: "citation needed". Last I checked Apple hadn't bothered going after anyone who'd unlocked their phone, or even anyone who'd distributed tools for unlocking phones. Also, it's questionable that the law would even support that -- there's a DMCA exemption for cell-phone unlocking, for example, which means the only likely grounds for going after someone would be civil proceedings based on breach of user agreements.
Which means that, um, you're spouting off a bunch of hyperbole unrelated to actual reality.