Great project! I don't really like any of the commercially available products, but this seems like it could tick all the boxes!

Is there a way to enable two way communication with the computer? Use case would be mute button for zoom or counter of unread emails / YouTube subscribers etc. I guess some status feedback could be achieved by mapping scroll lock / num lock if you are not using those, but this seems hacky and limited.

Could there be a custom software to replace the images from the desktop OS, or is it the MIDI path, suggested in #6 that is the way to go?