I actually use backspace a lot. I don't know of another hotkey on the keyboard that I can use to go back a page. If I space backspace it seems to alert me to do Alt + Backspace, but that doesn't function either.
These keys have obviously, even in this everything-in-the-WWW-browser age, still not embedded themselves thoroughly in the public consciousness. There are clearly sizeable classes of people who don't yet regard them as the norm; and people who still first think of keys other than those explicitly engraved for the purpose as the ones to use for it, or do not even know that such keys exist.
To those who are about to miss the point: Yes, your current keyboard doesn't have these keys. You didn't regard them as the norm when you bought a keyboard/computer. They haven't become so established that you don't regard systems without them as deficient, as you very probably would regard systems without (say) a "Super"/"Windows"/"Apple"/"Command" key. This, even in a world where doing many if not most things in a WWW browser is seen as the norm.
http://www.cultofmac.com/3147/opinion-apple-keyboards-need-b...