I found it just after many of the covid restriction were lifted, which resulted in businesses, schools and even churches getting rid of streaming gear on ebay. I'm not sure if it's still the case, but I found quite a few at that were sold around that price (I just checked my ebay account and it was $75).
Just checked and the price for new one where I live (Tel Aviv) is around $450, so I guess I was lucky, at least in that sense.
Still, I do not know of any cheaper option to get 1080p video with older machines. I'm assuming that OBS on a 2022 Macbook would be able to deal with live encoding, but back in 2021 I was still seeing posts on OBS forums detailing streaming issues with M1 macs, and since most of them describe issues with streaming on Twitch, I could only assume it must be for video conferencing.
