I saw a demo retinal dispaly at the university of washington in the late 90s.
I interviewed Dan Bricklin in '88 or '89 (for a magazine). Trippy dude. Lots of ideas.
Bricklin stated the optic nerve is exposed brain. So that when a laser projects an imagine directly on to the retina, it's like programming the brain.
Nope.
I decided right then and there I never needed a laser pointing at my eye ball.
I heard tell of a guy with massive cornea damage in one eye, some low-level university employee (facilities or something). They invited him to try it out, could see the image clear as day.
Lots of cool stuff being worked on at the HITlab those days. Seemed to kinda peter out.. or at least get less press.. in the years since.