I'm wearing the male version of those pants right now. They're called The Climbers - and they're the only pair of pants I own. You know those blogging technomads who have only one pair of jeans and a MacBook Air? Well I'm not a nomad but these pants dry fast, are tough, can be worn in semi-formal situations, and have crazy stretch. Jeans don't have any of those features, except maybe some toughness.
Who doesn't want to wear something that looks like pants, feels like sweatpants, and dry after a few hours after being laundered? I launder these about once a month. These are well worth the price.
For that price, I can buy 10 pairs of jeans on ebay, in a style that I like. Or I can go to the thrift store and get 50. I'll have wet ankles when I bike in the rain in a poncho, but whatever.
It's probably a personal preference type of thing. I don't like the feeling of having ten pairs of pants. I have this romantic notion that twenty years from now, I'm still be wearing the same $200 pair of pants (aged to perfection like a Barbour jacket), as opposed to a rotation of ten disposable pairs of pants.
I also happen to have two T shirts, one of which I wear for weeks in a row. It's merino wool. In the summer I switch to the other one for exercise, and that just gets handwashed when I'm done.
I realized that I'm gushing so hard about these pants, but I've been in search of the perfect pair of pants for the past five years and these are almost perfect.
Is that OCD? Wanting that one perfect thing that you can keep forever? Not sure, but I can't have it any other way.
Obviously one can also make that same argument for electric cars like the tesla, or SSDs when they were first released. The intel X18-M 80GB SSD was $700 when it was first released in 2008. New tech always starts out with low demand and high price.
For hackers, pants are not so incredibly useful. However, I'm guessing this company is not targeting computer professionals as their target market. If you're doing long distance cycling or you're a backpack/hiking kind of person, I'm sure odor/water resistant pants would be highly useful.
I think it makes sense to find clothes that suit you and stick with them. Jobs and his turtlenecks is a well known example. Saves a lot of bother in the long run. Not to mention the benefit of being able to order something online with some certainty and avoid the crazy local markups.
I pretty much live in ultra light, quick drying nylon cargo pants. They roll down to almost nothing when travelling. I would probably step up to something heavier duty if I did more physical work but they are much cooler than jeans in a warm climate and have a much quicker wash/dry cycle.
I have a couple black pairs of these triple-stitched and water-repellent tactical cargos for $5 each [1]. I think they are worth the full price of $65, but since I am stingy, I buy on closeout when available. They have some stretch as well. Only con is that they are too hot for 80+ degree weather.
I'm a huge fan of the Prana Brion (http://www.prana.com/brion-pant.html) - very similar to the one you linked, except without the cargo pockets. After getting these I'm never going back to pants without stretch fabric or water resistance. They're great for travel and in charcoal they look reasonably dressy too.
I wear pants that Toyota group factory workers wear. They are definitely not fashionable but are really performant. great in heat, cold, water resistant, usable for athletics, tear resistant, and cheap. I wish they were available readily, esp for the price I used to pay as an employee ($10/pair).
All of the website's sample images show a man running up stairs and traffic in shoes that would destroy your foot if you attempted to seriously run in them.
This feels a lot like bringing a burrito to your keyboard. You're not doing anything useful while you slop food into your face, and now you have a mess on your keyboard.
I will never need to transition from just-got-out-of-a-formal-dinner to running a marathon. Won't happen. And if it was going to happen, I have specialized clothing that works better for both purposes.
Who doesn't want to wear something that looks like pants, feels like sweatpants, and dry after a few hours after being laundered? I launder these about once a month. These are well worth the price.