I can't find it at the moment, unfortunately...
Tool die design for injection modeling is an art, a craft.
Lego's die tools are smaller, meaning they hold many fewer parts. They had more supply channels. So the parts would be formed more uniformly. I forget what they did to ensure the parts cooled more uniformly.
At the time, Mega Blocks were far inferior. The were using larger dies, more parts per die. So their bricks weren't as uniform. We used to bring in lots of other toys for inspection and play testing. I once assembled a Mega Block tank set. It just wouldn't stay together, with ill fitted pieces fighting against each other. The differences weren't even visible to the eye. Lego bricks just had better heft and fit.
Also at the time, and I imagine is still the case, Lego and Playmobile were the gold standards for plastic molding toys.
I'm just saying that you can't claim a price differential is justified by a cost differential without actually doing the math and providing X% cost differential ~+ X% price differential.
Because absent those being equal, we have to consider that there are more factors and without context we can't even determine the relevance of the cost factor.
In my view, the price differential exists simply because it can. People will pay $10, $20, $50 or more for a box of Legos. They grumble, sure. But they still buy them. I buy them because they work well, they're partnered with brands and properties that people also really like and they execute well in the tone and context of those brands.
But I'm of the mind that prices for all non-commodities are set by willingness to pay and costs are a function of how much profit corporations needs to justify their investment.
Ergo, that Lego spends more to make the pieces well is a consideration toward their profit margin. Not the price.
* A Lego compatible case, that can accept an Arduino board.
* A range of Lego compatible sensors and actuators
* Other components following the theme of integrating open-source with Lego.
* and so on...
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Edit: formatting
I started the Bitbeam project because I was prototyping some things in LEGO, but when it came time to figure out how to make many of them, I wasn't too excited about the cost of LEGO... but I was happy with my LEGO design. So I decided to port LEGO dimensions to materials that are easier and cheapier to source myself.
Some that are blessed by Lego: http://www.hitechnic.com/products
... and some that are not: http://www.mindsensors.com/ http://www.techno-stuff.com/
Also, this exists, targeted at the education market: http://www.vernier.com/products/interfaces/bta-nxt/
They did, and this was actually pretty hypocritical of lego because lego started out copying a UK design, the "Kiddicraft Self-Locking Building Bricks".
On another note, the lego brand is usually explained as 'play well' in Danish, but this is much more along the lines of 'goods to play with' (like in the German spielzeug or the Dutch speelgoed). Of course that doesn't isn't nearly as good marketingwise hence the 'play well' myth.
It's "legetøj" in Danish though, so I'm not sure how that becomes Leg go'. I've never heard "godt" in danish used for "goods".
Source?
While I don't speak Dutch, speelgoed literally translates to "toys". Several google searches on the etymology of leg godt didn't turn up any alternative definitions or connotations.
IOW, the parent is correct that "speelgoed" pretty much means "goods to play with". I have no knowledge about the Danish leg godt story, though.
Source: Native Dutch speaker