Rather, I consider it pretty easy.
Is this really what Windows users consider easy? On a Mac, it depends on the keyboard layout, but for me it's alt-2. A cent symbol is alt-4 (dollar is shift-4). Entering a character with an accent is alt-something for the accent and then the letter that it goes on top of. For example, i-umlaut is option-u then i.
If memorising unicode character numbers is your idea of good HCI, then I really hope I never use a program that you've designed.
But that's a pretty big "if" there
Oh, I agree - you'd have added a lot of hardware complexity and probably more than you'd be able to fit if you wanted to keep 7 of them in the thermal envelope of the Cell.
So when the NSA intercepts your hardware before it's delivered?
Just look for the guy in the black suit, sunglasses, and earpiece lurking around the door of your server room with a cell phone plugged into his laptop.
Let the machine do the dirty work. -- "Elements of Programming Style", Kernighan and Ritchie