Highlight locked contents instead of unlocked ones
Instead of using a special background color for unlocked (default) contents, locked contents should be highlighted via (light red?) background color in addition to reduced opacity. This would be consistent to other lists, where surface color is used as default background color.
Since the user has to lock contents actively, it should still be clear why contents appearance has changed and which contents are locked or unlocked now.
Furthermore only 10 percent of the users using the publishing range at all.