Still puzzles me: who touchtypes looking at the keys?

It's to light up your face while you're hacking with others at 3 in the morning. Makes you look prettier.

a lot of people.

none the less, i consider myself a better typist than average. i don't touchtype, certainly. still, i find it really difficult to orient my hands with respect to the keys if i can't see them. the backlight is helpful for when i'm putting my hands back on the keys.

Thanks. I mostly use the bumps on F and J for that. I guess I do look down when my hands are way off and not finding the right bumps right away; the light from the screen seems adequate then. shrug

People that can't type! But, why would someone who can't type buy such a keyboard?

I guess it's about aesthetics.

Aesthetics, right, ok.

Anecdotally: I've been programming for over 20 years. I am a fast and accurate typist, but I never learned to touch-type and as a consequence, I need to see my fingers relative to the keys occasionally. I cannot do this in the dark without backlit keys.

You should probably not assume that everyone who uses computers is a touch-typist.