The CPU/RAM/storage seem roughly reasonable for that price? And in general, I'd say it's only a rip-off if its price is out of line with what it costs to make or maybe if it's out of line with anything compatible, in which case it's beating everything else by virtue of 99% of phones not having its features (kill switches, nearly-mainline kernel, non-Android distro support) and what phones do compete on features lose on price (Librem 5) or specs (non-pro Pinephone).
It looks to me like his reply is based on the assumption of using it as a daily driver and yours is more focused on it as a dev device.
For me, it's not beating everything else by virtue of 99% of phones working as daily drivers out of the box. From all I've heard elsewhere, and even in comments in this thread from owners it clearly does not pass that bar.
It's never been marketed as anything but a development device. I don't think you can judge a device by holding it to a bar that it never set out to meet.
