Vim really is an editor: It's designed around changing existing text. Inserting new text is just one of the actions you can perform, and you can combine that

Vim really is an editor: It's designed around changing existing text. Inserting new text is just one of the actions you can perform, and you can combine that action with other modifiers, like "5ifoo<esc>" results in foofoofoofoofoo -- 5 repetitions of "insert foo"