I agree, FPGA is cheap enough and fast enough for m68k AmigaOS. Matthey, I understand your concerns, and I'm sure your points will materialize themselves when/if no compilers supports the changes/improvements that Gunnar has done. In the meantime, I dont think anyone/anything prevents someone else, for example you, from doing a more "conservative" m68k core for the Vampire boards.
FPGAs are wonderful tools for core development but the 68k will never be more than retro (and a slim chance for embedded) as FPGA only. A more compatible core and ISA is needed for both retro and embedded instead of an unused "performance" ISA which Gunnar is targetting. The following Atari forum link with one of the Mist creators talks about the Phoenix core on Mist:
http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=101&t=27442&sid=20370baaedca3a502b06a214d70aa186Compatibility is the first concern, then license, and performance is nice but less important. I bet the concerns are the same for other 68k FPGA hardware creators. I expect embedded markets to be the same way. Existing embedded 68k and ColdFire customers may want something faster but they need compatibility with their current code base. Phoenix isn't going to win over ARM customers overnight but it could win existing 68k and ColdFire customers if it was compatible enough and liked enough (radical 68k changes won't fly with these 68k fans any more than the retro guys). We are also missing an oppurtunity to have one united 68k standard which could be used in Phoenix, TG68, Suska, UAE, and with so many people using one standard, more likely an eventual ASIC. Instead, we could end up with another incompatible Amiga split like the current ones which are killing Amiga.
But yeah, a m68k cherry pi would be awesome, I would guaranteed buy a few, especially if the m68k has MMU and can run Linux, I want real hardware for my Linux/m68k again 
While the 68k integer and FPU ISA need a little refreshing and modernization, the 68k MMU design needs major changes. It may not be practical to keep it compatible. It would be good to investigate ways to ease adding at least partial memory protection and/or memory isolation and extended memory into the AmigaOS while also allowing for possible future SMP (AmigaOS 3 using a custom CPU has a better chance to maintain compatibility than AmigaOS 4 using an off the shelf CPU). ThoR needs to be involved and design us a new MMU standard
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My suggestion is to ignore what Gunnar is doing and join forces with other more likeminded people and "do it right", the best solution will win, right?
Like with AmigaOS 4, MOS, AROS, AmigaOS 3, etc.? Is the best Amiga winning or is all of Amiga losing?
I am sure that you are honest with what you are writing and really mean it but for now Gunnar offers the best 68k solution ever available and a payable also. That is what we need, a major hardware upgrade including 68k (at least 68020 compatible) and better graphics and sounds. I do not know whom you know or not but I do not believe at people investing millions of dollars in the market, not before products are there and the need is obvious. When you can show a working system and proof your concept by sales then you can go to a investor, not the other way round. Investors are cold calculators, they look how big is risk, what have I to invest and what do I earn and they expect a business plan. So first step is a working FPGA based system that can already be used with software being adapted to. I think we should gunnar simply let do his job. I see (from videos) more and more software running at a very high speed (and there is no improved chipset/RTG yet) that counts for me (and most others) and not abstract discussions about ISA details.
I agree that new affordable 68k hardware is what the Amiga needs but we need to plan and work together to keep the 68k Amiga pipeline full, to put it in processor terms. It is important to have a product to show but it is also important to have a good plan to show investors. I am an investor and I know other investors. You might be surprised by what I could make happen but I'm sure not going to pull my money out of safer investments to invest in something I don't believe in and in people I can't trust. Neither will I try to convince other investors to do the same or try to find other partners to invest with. I see potential here but I do not see anything investable yet.
I recall a target of PS3 level performance, gunnar von boehn later changed his promises to PS2 level performance. gunnar always promised that the cpu will be faster than g4.
Any mention of PS3 performance must have been before I was involved with Natami which wasn't particularly early. The PS3 has a lot of potential performance but it it difficult to take advantage of. An enhanced 68k Amiga SoC ASIC with good 3D implementation added might not have as much theoretical performance but could be much easier to program perhaps making it seem surprising close to the performance of a PS3. I think a Cherry Pi could be made which could outperform the new Raspberry Pi 2 at a moderatly higher cost, with everyone working together and with proper funding (oddly never tried with the Natami despite tremendous interest).
I believe the current Phoenix core outperforms a PPC G4 clock for clock in integer performance and in memory performance. Enable the 2nd (and possibly 3rd) integer pipe, clock it up, up the caches, add branch prediction and add an FPU and it should be able to walk all over an equally clocked G4.
