From: David Fetter <dfetter@xxxx.xxx.xxx>
Everybody has heard that hoary old joke about what would happen if Microsoft built cars, but here's a new twist...

If the Linux community built cars

  1. Every time they repainted the lines on the road, some eager mechanic would fix your car so it ran faster and more reliably.
  2. Your car would keep running for 5,000 miles on a gallon of gas.
  3. If you felt like reinstalling the engine, you could do it in an hour with one hand. The transmission would not be affected.
  4. Your bicycle-sized car would comfortably seat twenty people. You could add more seats without tools.
  5. Your car would run on roads, rivers, lakes and mountain trails. Some engineers would be testing the flying model.
  6. Microsoft, Macintosh, Sun, DEC, ARM and Amiga owners would get free upgrades to their cars, which would make them run much faster.
  7. The oil, engine, gas and alternator lights would be designed sensibly, with plenty of places to add other sensors as needed.
  8. New seats would recline, tilt, swivel, and rub your back. The cup holders would be well-insulated and hard to spill from.
  9. The airbag system would bounce off the ceiling and come at you from front and sides, instead of taking Junior's head off.
  10. If you were involved in a crash, your car would hand you a videotape of what happened. 
From: Chad Cunningham <ccunning@xxx.xxx.xxx>
I am a little mad at linux right now, and feeling malicious, so I think you forgot a few things:

If the linux community built cars, part II:

  1. The linux car would be free, but you would have to build it yourself.
  2. It would not come with a manual, and you would have to get it working and connected to the internet before you could find instructions.
  3. There would be no dealership to take it to for service.
  4. If your car broke down, AAA would assume you are an idiot and tell you to read the man pages.
  5. It would have a couple of windows, but they couldn't be used to actually drive the car.
  6. It would get great gas mileage, but there aren't a lot of gas stations, and most of them are still in the beta stage.
  7. It would come ready to fit anyone, but if you wanted to recline the seats, you would have to rebuild the engine.
  8. To turn the car, you would have to tell it which direction to turn, what the radius should be, how fast to execute the turn, what to do if something goes wrong, and it would all have to be done in sequence using syntax that is always hard to remember.
  9. Your gas gage would be hidden in a compartment in the trunk.
  10. Everyone else who drove the linux car would laugh at any suggestions that the car be easier to drive.