just consider, the n900 is not the avarage mainstream consumer product, it is stll a niche product for tech geeks.

most people with that kind of tech affinity rather tend to like their gadgets clean, simple and minimalistic style wise. I do work as I Graphics Artist and Userinterface Designer and I really appreciate Interfaces that tend to reduce instead of trying to cram tons of unnecessary visual information into a tiny space. There are times were I work on projects were the clients wants a *blinged* out interface and it always breaks my heart if the client doesn't listen to my advice saying that it will most likely confuse more people, and it will not give the application the extended usability they actually long for.

in a sentence:

keep it as simple as possible and you will most likely have no confused user of your application - and this one of the most important rules of interface design

just my 2 cents