Jentlemen,
few posts above, it was mentioned that significant (to say the least) amounts of sunlight will be absorbed by dark open waters where usually there is ice (by this time of the year). This, though, is not all.
In everyday terms, one part ice at 0 Β°C will cool almost exactly 4 parts water at 20 Β°C to 0 Β°C. (some numbers about it - see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_of_fusion#Applications ).
The opposite is also correct: heating 4 parts of water from 0 to 20 Β°C - would be prevented, if there was 1 part of ice in that water at the start.
Which, regarding mentioned above regions, is not the case anymore: those regions on photos above - open water have no surface ice, and it seems quite like a glass with dark bottom and without ice cubes, and then that glass is put into the sun. I mean, this is about much faster local temperature rise, since there are no "ice cubes" (in those locations) to halt the temperature rise (driven by sunlight).
This will definitely alter athmospheric events in Arctic significantly (short-term), among other things. I'd expect an increase of number but reduction in average size of athmospheric events in Arctic, as such conditions (more "glasses without ice cubes") develop significantly during last decade. I wonder if such a trend could already be noticed during last ~10 years. Myself, i don't have reliable relevant data to answer this.
near-surface warm water currents are obviously another thing. Good oprtion of that heat which "was expected to melt ice _here_, but since there was no ice _here_ this year - this heat was spent to warm up water _here_ instead" - good oprtion of this heat will be transferred by water currents to nearby location and it'll "meet" some ice some time later, and will melt part of it. Thing is, _that_ ice _there_ - has its own melting forces ("traditional" ones), so it'll melt faster - whole thing feeds on itself, the less ice is there, the more warm water "attacks" it from more and more directions, more and more often. Important thing is, this will get extra heat into cloudy places and effect things there - unlike albedo positive feedback, which is very dependant on (absense of) the cloud cover.