No, the current legitimate unlocked iPhone proposals don’t mesh well with my previous scenario of Apple selling unlocked iPhones directly to customers since they have in fact still chained themselves to a carrier and they are still trying to sell phones with that carrier, and for some odd reason, the carrier would like it if people bought the shackled version and had to sign up with all kinds of long-term plans with them instead of just getting a pure unlocked version.
My scenario wasn’t a “you just wait until the unlocked iPhones inevitably pop up in Europe” scenario, it was a “what if they had never gone with a carrier to begin with” scenario. They have a five year contract with AT&T, so I don’t have high hopes for there being such a thing for a while, unless they have different length contracts with European carriers. Apple already knows that people want an unlocked iPhone.