What’s the justification for the cost of this thing? Seems crazy expensive.
It's mostly for pinning a lavalier mic on "talent."
It would be intended mainly for things like keynote presentations, hiding on a film actor, on someone jumping around in a stage musical, or other professional applications like interviews, in order to supplement the boom mic.
Smaller and waterproof are very helpful in terms of mounting and hiding, when you want to conceal the view of the pack.