This does however means if you need to use it, it's upside down and breathing wet - at least with many/most(?) regs. This puzzles me a bit as I'm sure when I was practicing air donation during my PADI OW, they told me to turn over the reg so it'd breathe dry, and I haven't tried out yet whether this is harder to do with my own octo.
I'm also a left hand alternate diver. In the quickest deployment it's upside down and breathes a tiny bit wet. For a longer term deployment I can twist it over my head for comfortable right side up use.
Pete