And, yet, Nokia manages to sell phones in the US that aren't vetted through carriers as well as selling phones that are vetted through carriers. That would seem to contradict your scenario.

I mean, I've had 5 Nokia phones. Only one of which was sold to me by a vendor (a MetroPCS CDMA phone, even; the rest were all GSM phones). Only one other had been a vendor branded phone. Two came directly from Nokia. Only one was a "grey market" phone. Yet, if what you're saying were true, because Nokia sells direct and bypasses the carriers, we shouldn't be seeing T-Mobile and AT&T Nokia phones.

Yet, we plainly and clearly do. I can get a Nokia E71-2 which has been available for 9ish months and has NO AT&T tie in (other than being AT&T 3G compatible). Or, I can get an E71x, which is about to be released through AT&T. Basically the same phone, except that one is vendor vetted and the other one has been available for a long while before vendor vetting. There's probably some subtle software variations (I'm willing to bet the E71x doesn't have a SIP client).

If what you're saying is true, why does the E71x exist? Why do other AT&T Nokia phones exist? According to your scenario, the existence of a direct-sales E71-2 should be causing AT&T to back away from Nokia phones. Yet, that's not the case.