Hm... You know what might be neat for some ships? Robotron mode! (In case you're not aware, that means: aim with mouse, wasd keys move you in that direction - so, regardless of facing, 'w' makes you move north, etc. Should work well for ships that are good at strafing; likely would work rather poorly for larger slower ships with limited side-to-side mobility, as robotron mode only allows you to thrust in 8 different directions, and if none of those 8 match up to "forwards"...)
Still. Would likely be fun to play with, especially for some of the zippier frigates.