The engineer who decided to hardwire the batteries in place will kill a lot of market share once folks realize that if there is a power/battery issue - they have to send the entire phone in for service(and pay shipping)
No clue, but AT&T already started the lawsuits against people unlocking them - cease and desist and sometimes even preemptive lawsuites have been filed against those claiming to either offer or will offer starting X date - unlocking services for iPhones...