I agree with aflegg on all that he says here.
Particularly on his disagreement over the fact that the n810 is not a consumer device.
The Nokia 770 was not a consumer device, but the N800 and N810 are cleary targeted to the end user.
And they well fulfill end-user expectations if the user uses and sees it for what it is meant to be: a sofa/travel/fun companion.

As for the Backup/Restore issues, much as to be accounted to bad developer/porter practice.
The backup/restore application can and should be instructed on what more it has to backup, as for this developer tutorial: Use of Back-up Application

We can't and should not blame Maemo here, they gave us the tool. We (developers/porters) just need to use it.