[alpaca128]

> IMO there's no good reason to omit possibilities for aesthetics.

My point is that it's not for aesthetics but comfort. For aesthetics I wouldn't use vertical stagger or a split layout.

With a 40% keyboard you can enter everything without moving hands or wrists at all and more important keys are moved right below the thumbs so I can use Ctrl and Shift without twisting my hand.

All said and done I still think that the standard keyboard layout is actually not a bad choice either, and is sometimes underrated. I just think that some more experimental boards manage to be just as productive while removing some ergonomical weaknesses.