Strange Loop has sold out every year and the conference is really about the people you can hang out with and the non-talk parts as much as seeing the content. So, no.
The videos are filmed and released as a partnership between Strange Loop and InfoQ. Strange Loop gets excellent videographers, professional gear (hardware screen capture devices), and on-site editing for early access release for very low cost and virtually no work. InfoQ gets eyeballs to their site. Attendees get draft videos available within days after the conference. Non-attendees get free access to almost all of the content from the conference (at a delay). Minor nits aside, this is from my perspective a win for everyone.
Part of this equation is that InfoQ wants to receive those eyeballs by dribbling out content over many months. This slow release is also a useful marketing tool for the conference (although this is less essential than in the past).
As most folks have mentioned up to about $100 would put it in my impulse buy range. If it was higher I would probably review the talk descriptions and twitter/blog reviews before I decided.
