I disagree.
The prices are to be frank, extortionate and the shipping too. You can get nearly everything they sell from other vendors for 1/4 of the cost. Most of their product range is carefully repackaged upsells, for example the ESP8266 boards. They added a brand "Feather" and build an ecosystem around it and some neat packaging, copying the Arduino model and now a starter kit is $70 + $37 shipping to UK. Or $17 for the base module. A functionally identical module can be purchased for $2.59. In fact it's less than the minimum order on Tayda so I have to buy two just to get over the $5 minimum. That is $7.02 for two including shipping. You can build the entire starter kit for less than $10!
A prime example is the $3 parts inventory here:
https://www.adafruit.com/product/2975
They're a fine example of how to build a business and run the marketing and building an ecosystem around it. They're another rising Radio Shack or Tandy and nothing more. The main benefit they have is timing, hype and no physical presence on the high street which was what took RS out. I respect her accomplishment not as an engineer but a business-person.
As for alternatives to interview him; Woz, Jeri Ellsworth...
On the subject of 3d printers, they are amazing when they work but they tend not to show you the hours of frustrating pain involved in getting one up, working and calibrated. I know two people who have purchased them (4 total printers) so far and they've never got them to perform as advertised. We're in the infancy of such things so I'm sure things will improve over time. I'm holding out for one that works as well as the first HP Deskjets did!