It's possible it's experiencing the same gradual and nearly imperceptible quality decline (from insanely great to merely extremely good) that most Apple products have been undergoing the last 5-7 years, but I will reserve judgement until I have one (two, actually) in hand. Apple's brain drain and productmanagerization is sadly very real.

Fingers crossed that someone in Apple is holding it to the same standards as AudioAccessory1,1 (HomePod1), but not holding my breath as I think the guy who I believe was the main force behind it (Christopher Stringer) left Apple to create a company called Syng and a product called the Cell Alpha.

A stereo pair of Cell Alphas is $4500. A stereo pair of HomePod2s is $600.

Also, I think one of the main reasons the HP1 flopped is because it was too expensive. If this thing is 95% as good as the HP1 but stays in production because people are buying it because Apple figured out how to sell it for 15% cheaper, then it's a win.

We'll see!