People thought Apple making a phone was odd. No one thought mobile phones, or even smart phones were odd. Mobile phones were common when the iPhone came out, and even smart phones weren't uncommon. And once the iPhone did come out, there was immediate interest.

AR though, that's something the public hasn't shown much interest in yet. These products are looking more like the Segway (which was once supposedly going to revolutionize transportation) - cool, popular in a few niche markets, but not the revolution that people imagine them to be.

To be clear, not disagreeing with your core point, but as a reference comparison, the Meta Quest 2 sold more units in its first 2-2.5 years than Apple sold iPhones (and iPhone 3G) in the equivalent time period.

Yep. People forget that the original iphone that could only run built-in apps really was a failure; it was only when they opened up the app store that it exploded (perhaps aided by this Cartmanland marketing strategy).

Nobody thought Apple making a phone was odd. Even prior to the announcement of the original iPhone and prior to any rumors about actually making a phone, the internet was full of amateur 3D mockups of what an "iPhone" could be like, including looking like an iPod with a click-wheel. They had conquered the personal media player market, and now people wanted a phone with the design of an iPod to carry less stuff in their pockets.

Everyone forgets that the nerds had windows ce phones before Apple hit the market. It was the 3GS and 3rd party dev arcade games that converted me. Apples challenge now is how to convince people who hate them to go to work for them.

I was one of those nerds! I equally loved it and loathed it. Some very cool software available, but as a cellphone-like experience, it was neither one thing nor the other. Most of the time I had a feature-phone as a daily-driver alongside the clunky early Windows stuff. Wasn't a bad compromise as I didn't want or need the power of Pocket PC/Windows Mobile 24/7, but it was however a fairly expensive one!

People also forget that using a stylus with a touchscreen made it a pretty crappy phone, and they weren't ergonomic to hold up to your face with a lot of the larger PDA-like ones. The Windows devices with sliding keyboards were pretty decent as a compromise in terms of size and features though. But boy were they expensive in the UK at the time as they were generally imports from the USA.

I loved my htc with the slide out keyboard! Sure, it would reboot occasionally when you slid the keyboard out and it took 45 minutes to send an email on edge but that was back to the future stuff back then.

Windows CE or Nokia N95 or Nokia 9500.

Yup. The App Store didn't come until the iPhone 3G. iPhone 1 had no non-native apps. (later backported)

These AR/VR are definitely a doomed profile unless somehow these things were given away for basically free. IMHO success for any new technology usually comes from: 1. Does it make you look more attractive? NO 2. Does it make you money? NO except for the YouTubers who will surely be pandering about how meme they are. How many streamers us VR? Oh yeah... 3. Does it make me more valuable to others? No? I can't see a mass adoption are where having a computer strapped to your face which enhances your productivity. This may be the area most attackable by some great use cases, but I don't see them today (once again, mass market in a way that Apples of the world would give an F).

Nobody thought Apple making a phone was odd. Phone + MP3 players were already in everybody's pockets. Telcos were making money selling ringtones for $2.99 a pop. Apple already had a digital music store. It all lined up. And that was before they tested the waters with the Moto ROKR in 2005.

Back in 2010 there were rumours of Apple building TVs and cars. Those would be weird because they're in areas where Apple had no experience and no software content to provide.