[adrianmalacoda]

Free (Libre) Software is very often gratis as well, and generally breaks the "if you're not the customer..." rule. In the case of Android, there are community-maintained forks that do not include any of the Google stuff.

[creatornator]

It might be true that libre software can break that rule. AOSP isn't libre, and the libre forks are so hobbled by limited access to Apps and the Play Store that there IS a cost to using them: the cost of losing very useful features that are only available in AOSP.