I've got to say, I used to think this too, but I've found that Swype is really good for entering data. Try it out sometime, you will be surprised.

I bought an Epic 4G thinking that I absolutely needed the keyboard, and now I barely use it.

I've used Swype a fair amount. It works well enough for one-handled input, but it's still much slower than using the Epic keyboard with two thumbs. The real problem with Swype and other virtual keyboards is that they occupy ~40% of what's already a tiny screen. So then I can't see the context of what I'm replying to, or more than a few lines of my own text.

Swype transformed my on screen keyboard experience. The stock android keyboard is lackluster, even frustrating. Swype beta made text messaging actually useful for me.

A tiny keyboard is still a tiny keyboard; hardware or software. You're not going to feel comfortable writing long messages on anything but a physical full-size keyboard until direct-neural interfaces appear.