You're not wrong, and I had similar thoughts when I started. Reason is I already had a good RISC-V boilerplate for for completely different project and so I took the plunge. RISC-V has clear disadvantages when it comes to performance, but also clear advantages when it comes to licensing and being a significantly more open platform. Crypto related operations are insanely expensive, but a computer module + daughter board with a hardware crypto solution could potentially resolve that.
Regardless, this is a proof of concept, conversation piece and exploration in general. I don't really expect this to become production. It has been very fun though :D
