Jalyst, what are the facts:

Fact 1. Not a single peeling issue has been reported from N9 that are "made in Finland".
Fact 2. My N9 is 5 months old and made in Finland. No peeling of any kind (touch wood)
Fact 3. The N9 has a clear coat of hardened polycarbonate on top of the main polycarbonate. It is NOT painted.

I still believe that peeling issues are mostly related to fake units. Fake in the sense that bad batches has entered the market through dubious resellers and outlets. But also fake in the sense that cheap plastic imitations of the housing are floating around.

The peeling clearly is a production error (on those that are genuine Nokia). But IMO Nokia has done a piss poor design job. They should not have coated them in the first place. There is no need for this coating other than visual appearance. The white ones may in fact need it, or else it wouldn't stay white for all that long. The whole story is just sad, because what could and should have been real cool, has ended up being a joke.