I think the touchbar was my favorite part of my old MBP, specifically because of the contextual buttons that are always changing.

I'd probably pay a little extra to get one on future non-Mac laptops, but not too much extra.

Yeah, most people I know almost never use F keys (except perhaps F1 for help). They leave it on the media-keys mode... which is the same as the touchbar's default values, but without needing to know what mode it's in.

With the physical media keys, if they want to mute, it's always the same button. Pause music, always the same button. They're great in a way that the touchbar completely destroys.

(and yes, I know you can change this setting, but if we're assuming non-techy-users we also generally have to assume default settings.)

Honestly, I hardly ever used the function keys either. As a result the Touch Bar doesn't really bother me -- but neither does it seem the slightest bit useful for the most part.

Lot of non-hn people also type while looking at the keyboard and some with single finger from both hands.