Inside the iPhone Gray Market

MSN has an interesting and fairly detailed article covering the history and direction of the iphone unlocking market. From the article:

In January, Walberg [owner of pdacable.com] found a cheap Turbo SIM knockoff sold by a Chinese supplier. He packages the device to create an altered SIM card and sells them for $44. His customers include London businessmen and retailers in Mexico, Brazil, and other locales. He's even getting calls from carriers that don't want to share their profits with Apple, as AT&T and others have agreed to do. That way, customers can come in with their iPhone, buy Walberg's device, and skirt Apple's exclusive provider. "I don't know if [these carriers] can legally encourage unlocking, but they're not going to discourage it," says Walberg. "This market will go on forever, because I don't think there's a way for Apple to stop us."