BITD I raced with a NR equipped bike and I still have the groupset kicking around. They were good brakes, (and BITD they made sense because I could buy every single part as a spare) but I've used a lot of brakes before and since, and I would not go out of my way to buy similar brakes again if I wanted to use them in all weathers on a regular basis. This would count double if I needed to use longer reach variants so that I could fit mudguards beneath.
The reason is four-fold; first the market is indeed driven by loony collectors on the whole. Second the finish on the brakes, whilst good, is still prone to corrosion on some parts, third, spare parts are not so easy to find these days, fourth, you can get performance as good or better out of many different brakes these days.
Any NR/SR brake is a good brake but you can do as well or better and other brakes may (for various reasons) be more practical.
An anecdote; a few years ago a chum of mine who was planning on a new replacement (high end) road bike came to visit. We went out and did a day ride and I loaned him a road bike I had cobbled together from spare parts. It had a 753 frame, sprint wheels and mostly campag NR/SR parts. The main exception was the brakeset, which had worn BL-1051 levers (with custom made phosphor bronze pivot bushes installed) and blue finished short reach BR-1050 calipers, debadged except for the shimano logo. Obviously it was pretty well set up. Since he'd not seen the blue finished calipers before, he didn't know what they were; he was sufficiently impressed with the brakeset performance that he enquired if the brakes were Dura-Ace ones or something.
I don't blame him; I have owned and used both on the same bike and with the same cables and brake blocks in them I wouldn't be able to tell the difference with my eyes closed. Campag NR brakes are as not quite as good as either.
cheers