Steve69

Judging something without having a chance to put your hands on to try, sometimes results in incorrect impression about product. Sony QX lenses are example.
Myself, I had no idea about many ways these can be used before I got one. Looking just on product ad I though - Another gadget to carry around, I thought. But once I got it in my hands and started to use it, I realized its potential.
Examples:
1. self-photogtaphy. This is true breakthrough, it allows to take perfect pictures of yourself and parties posing with you because you can actually see the picture composition, arrangement, yourself as you would imagine it should look like. How many times you asked someone to take a picture of you or trying to play with your camera and the tripod and was not happy because something was wrong and shot had to be repeated? Having view of the scene in the palm of your hand with yourself makes it so easy. I am able to take pictures if myself or loved ones accompanying me in situations I could never do before. Not only steady family portraits but dynamic scenes when objects including myself move. And I can capture it in the right time... in this perfect moment.
2. "Go where no camera can reach"
Ok, try to take a picture of part of yourself like back, which you do not see everyday panning on the spot you expect to. No way with standard camera. Or go underneath the cramped desk or wall curb to take photo of something that is hidden behing the corner
3. Spy camera , no comment needed on this I suppose. Ways of use in this mode are endless.

I got myself QX10 model because of x10 optical zoom and smaller size. Picture quality is veey good including indoor low light shots, no flash needed.
This is perfect smartphone companion if you look beyond just phone photography. It broads way of taking photos in the go resulting in amazing pictures which could never be taken neither with phone or regular camera.

Imagine your future dslr lens leaking, messing up your camera bag... ;)

unless, Nikon decides to etch or engrave password warning in capitals on the side of the lens. but then again, assuming thief knows and can read English...

Nikon does not say the password would be mandatory. Anyone who do not want to use it may probably skip it. But for those who might feel this would give them advantage, password option could come handy.
It's little like with cellphones. Most of people do not even bother with protecting its content against being used fraudulently. But they should. Not because their phones get stolen often but lots of user just loose it.
The validity of patenting password protection for lenses is another story. US patent law execution is just ridiculous. IT allows you to patent "wheel" again if it used for specific purpose or application. But that is just system gap that have been created to feed greedy patent seeking business entities, not true inventors.

as i recall punch cards had storage capacity of less than 128bytes which means that you would need almost 8.5 million cards to store equivalent of 1 GB of data. this makes 536,870,912 cards to replicate storage capacity of this latest 64GB transcend card. not sure if it would fit in my living room.

based on your post this product might not be dedicated to educated customer like yourself. they won't cry if you choose not to get one.

Finally P300-like model with manual focus.

Great lookig lens. But someone could say using KR terminology, "It's the perfect model for gear masturbators".

Just pre-ordered one from Amazon for my D700. They say it should ship on June 29th. Meanwhile I am looking now how eBay prices are going down on previous versions of this walk-around lens...