This is pretty funny.
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I find it embarrassing to talk to my iPhone, perhaps to ask for directions, am I alone in this?
(talking to a person at the other end of the line is different)
How about this for laughs (maybe) …
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I like how Jony (is it me or has he become really fat lately?) waxes on about San Francisco, my home town, being this special place of optimism. And yet they managed to carefully tailor their long soapy bromance intro such that you can’t see a single bum or fentanyl dealer or tent or naked psychotic screaming at the sky of which this city otherwise is chock full of. Integrity people. If you are that phony (or believe you have to act in such a phony manner) and expect the rest of the world to be too gullible to notice your little subterfuge, do you really expect to be taken serious by anybody who matters? Post-factual age indeed. 
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Well, they shot the video at a place that is owned by Francis Ford Coppola, just adjacent to the district where all of the buildings have been bought up, in a manner similar to how Disney acquired its land in Florida for Disney World, by Ive, a couple of other mega-cap tech bros who cashed out, and a few VCs who are all competing to build company compounds. So “Iveyland” and its immediate surroundings is kept pretty sterile compared to other parts of SF both by private security and by the city government.
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Well I suppose then we don’t quite agree on what “sterile” means. 
But since you mention Francis Ford Coppola’s joint, it did confuse me that they shot it such that you first think they’re headed to Vesuvio only to then end up in Zoetrope. Oh well.
I do that all the time, but I guess I’m not a normal person!
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Not at all.
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Even a non tech Illuminati like me is skeptical. I’ve is a good designer…but his incessant devotion to thin leads to limited battery life and things like bendgate. And the Vision Pro has pretty much turned out to be a flop from what I’ve seen. And I agree with Jason that there’s nobody to tell him no which isn’t a great thing.
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The Segway scooter was a wonderful invention, and I would have one today if the price was right. It’s a brilliant piece of engineering, with an aspect which seemed magical—the ability to stay upright on only one axle.
Its difficulty with non-smooth sidewalks was a problem, but not an insurmountable one. Larger wheels would have done the trick, and enabled the Segway to negotiate mismatched sidewalk sections, uplifts from roots, and pine cones.
The irony of the Segway story is that everyone said it was too expensive, but today, people all over are riding bicycles which cost as much as or more than a Segway. And I still walk, because neither is affordable! But that’s a good thing for my health, I suppose.
Will Jony and Sam’s new toy be affordable? Likely not, and there’s the rub. If you want to take over the market, you have to make it affordable. The iPod was affordable, the first iPhone was affordable (ok, they “cheated” by having AT&T subsidize it), the Apple Vision Pro is not, the Segway is not, e-bikes are certainly not. In the past decade or so, the tech bros have fallen in love with themselves and their toys, and completely forgotten what every business school teaches: if you price your product for a tiny market of billionaires, you won’t sell millions of units. For that, you need pricing for the masses.
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I rode a Segway once, very briefly, and immediately understood why George W. Bush fell off one. It was designed for people who are not very active. Like Bush, I’m a bicyclist, and when you bicycle and you learn how to balance the bike quickly and effectively – and much too fast for the Segway handle. The friend whom I had was dropping off at her house had no problems with the Segway, but she was moving slowly and carefully because she had an injured wrist. But I immediately realized I was reacting too quickly and got off to avoid falling.
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How interesting! So it sounds like your experience with the Segway was quite similar to my experience as a youngster when I first rode as a passenger on a motorcycle. I forget who was the driver, but I remember being told how important it was that I not try to shift my weight to balance the ‘bike’, but just go along with the driver’s movements. My natural urge was incredibly difficult to fight against, but I managed to do it.
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Just a note: Warby Parker - the retail Glasses chain - is teaming up with Google and its AI, and no doubt we’ll see other outfits follow suit (pun intended) as this market gets super-competitive. I do know of some materials/industrial AI companies promising to reconfigure the manufacturing materials production process - this will be as revolutionary as Desktop Publishing was in the 80s/90s. Medical devices will benefit directly and it will be interesting to see who mates with who as AI technology powers increase and its containment decreases.
“Smart glasses” is a much tougher technology than most people think. The human eye evolved to focus from your hand to far away, and it gets tired quickly if you try to focus an inch or two away. We don’t focus our eyes on our glasses (or cataract implants or contacts), the optics bend the light on its way to your retina. Your eye muscles get tired trying to focus very close, so you get eyestrain (in the form of headaches or sometimes nausea) if you try to do it too much. I asked an Apple store “genius” about how long people can wear Apple Vision and she said it was about 40 minutes. Canadian military scientists found soldiers could not use Microsoft HoloLens more than 25 minutes without suffering problems.
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I was really hoping Augmented Reality would take off, but - like Virtual Reality - it’s incidental. Maybe there’s a way AR and glass and eyeball could get along - but - I did not go “apple watch” because I don’t like wearing watches (my only worn jewelry is a wedding ring). I know a lot of folks who love their watch/wrist devices. I don’t like headphones that much either (even though I produce music all the time). Anyhow I think there’s a disconnect between a personal computer and a personal “device attached”. We’ve all watched those dystopic movies with people ladened up with devices - we (all) don’t want that, do we? While I’m excited by AI assisting researchers (esp in medicine, but in so many other ways!) with generationally dynamic computing- I’m not sure how devices end up in all this.
On a side note but related - what bothers me is now that long after Ive has been gone from Apple, they are still committed to making iPhones almost as thin as credit cards year after year. As this makes the phone most difficult to hold on the side, I’d much rather have a chunkier phone which could also sport a larger battery. And with the exception of the MacBook Air which began its life slim and thin, the same thin design applies to Apple’s laptop models. We had to give up many useful ports for only a couple USB-Cs to support all that thinness!
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Likewise abnormal: Since I’m presbyopic (far-sighted), like most of the population over ~ 45 years of age, an iPhone screen is too small for maps and directions when I’m driving, which is why I use an 11-inch iPad Pro for that (among many other things). Trying to drive while wearing reading glasses is A Bad Idea, and I’ve never been able to make bifocals work for me. More power to those who can.
I’m with you. Presbyopia can make you far-sighted, but it actually describes the hardness of your lens that comes with age so your eyes cannot adjust your depth of focus. I’ve got the same problem, and also had cataract surgery gave me clear vision from a meter or two to infinity. It’s a big step up from having to wear thick glasses to do anything; now I only need thin reading glasses and only for reading and close work. But it does mean that I have to put on my reading glasses to see anything on a small screen, and even with reading glasses I have trouble with small type on small screen, and a map on an iPhone is useless.