As long as the difference is $2000 for an unbranded phone vs $20 for a carrier version, I’ll keep putting up with the bullshit (or rather installing a custom ROM). But you are absolutely right. This is mostly a carrier thing. Though of the two times I got an unbranded phone, one of them was the Galaxy 4, and it still had bullshit I couldn’t get rid of or didn’t want. It also was one of the hardest to install custom firmware to. I would never buy a Samsung phone carrier branded or not.