Shouldn't Jackson West be the one making this post? And shouldn't he be including before and after pics of a M5 and a wrecked M5? Long live the bourgeoisies!

M5, not bad.

but get a Porsche, there is no substitute.
[911-forum.com]

So this *might* be the car of the Mozilla foundation chair? Your evidence is that it's expensive and has a Mozilla vanity plate? Stop the presses!

If you know anything about Bimmers, you know that the E39 M5 is the one to get: [polls.gawker.com]

The E60 M5 represents all that has gone wrong in Munich under Chris Bangle's supervision. Owning one just indicates a lack of taste.

somehow i don't think everyone in mozilla makes that kind of dough..

its good to be the top boss isn't it.

The vanity plate should read "BLANCHE" or "BDUBOIS".

I watched a show on the founders of the internet the other day. Surprisingly, not a single person mentioned Al Gore. Anyway... one of the male founders of Netscape was driving that car with that license plate. I was going to look up who that someone was, but then realized that I just didn't care that much.

Last I knew, the MOZILLA plate belonged to Netscape founder Lou Montulli.

i believe that's the plug & play tech center lot in sunnyvale (planet granite in the background behind the trees). i've seen it in the lot just only recently (hard to miss the distinctive license plate).

FSM FTW!

Pretty sure that's Montouli's (or some other former Netscaper.)

For those of you who didn't know, "Mozilla" goes back to like 1994 and was the codename for Netscape 1. A lot of people made a lot of money during the Netscape heydays

@lawrence: There are a lot of substitutes, and plenty of them clock in under 30k. Ever since $32,000 Evo's started tearing 911 Turbos on a track they've been playing up the INTANGIBLES and IT JUST FEELS RIGHT bullshit. Fuck Porsche.

@SwatLax: Or the E46 M3, which even purists agree was an amazing car, despite the initial problems with the S54.

the M5 still looks like a Jetta

@Deezil

same could be said for Ferrari, Lamborghini, etc etc

why do people still desire those makes?

it's more than just what shows up on the spec sheet dollar-for-dollar, and horsepower for horsepower.

if you could afford it, test drive those makes...and you'll be sold on the "intangibles" lol. those 'intangibles' is what makes your soul instantly dance as you step on the gas.

Porsche [911-Forum.com]

@googoobaby: really? I should of tried harder when I saw her in private functions. dang.

Comment on What kind of $80,000 car did your Firefox bug fix buy? Are we supposed to be upset that he has a decent car? Maybe if we didn't all spend 10 hours a day using the product he oversees (and many of us to make these comments) then we'd have some grounds. It's hard enough to make money selling products to people, we should be happy that someone did a good job of monetizing an Open Source software project and did so in a way that was completely non-invasive to end-users. Mad props to Mozilla

ha

I will admit to it being mine.

The posters were correct in pointing out that it was parked at the Plug and Play tech center in Sunnyvale.

The posters are also correct in pointing out that the Bangle styling leaves something to be desired, but the cars performance more than makes up for it. The key feature of the M5 is the fact that it has 4 doors and seats 4 comfortably. I preferred the overall drive of the Porsche's that I have owned, but none of them seat 4, except the Cayanne, and that one doesn't really count. If you look closely at the picture you may be able to see the kids car seats. :)

BTW- if you are reading this, are a software engineer with distributed systems, and C++ experience, and want to be an early employee at a start up. Drop me a line at lou [at] montulli.org

@Dweezil: No matter how hot the Evo is, you're still a pimply faced teenage boy-racer from south san-jo in one. It's got to be one of the most offensively styled cars in automotive history.

@matto: The Evo is just an extreme example--a car that looks like a toaser is better on a track than a 911. Maybe it's my C6 love showing, but Porsche is just horribly overrated. Ferrari and Aston and their ilk have limited production on their side, Porsche is a mass-producer of supposed "exotics" that are diluted (by the Cayenne and the Boxster) and no longer king of the hill in anything else. All the "intangibles" (which is a nice way of saying you get show off when driving it, the interior materials are nice, it's got a well-tuned suspension so it gives road feedback without acting like an S2000) are done better by both other mass-producers and other exotic brands.

I appreciate the 911 from a historical perspective, and the GT2 and Carrera GT still give the Porsche name from credibility, but they were passed over in looks, performance and prestige a long time ago by a lot of manufacturers.

@Dweezil: You had me for most of the first para; all the fluff in the Porsche product line really is kind of a sad joke. I really can't think of a nicer set of wheels than a GT3 or Turbo S, though.

@matto: The GT3 and the Turbo are fine cars, I mentioned the Carrera and the GT2 (I guess the GT3 RS could be thrown into this) from an enthusiast perspective as giving them some continued credibility. But the Turbo and the GT3 aren't the problem, the problem is people like the Hamster talk about various intangibles and the Porsche name when the reality is that, with the exception of the cars they produce that can basically only be driven on a track, they're not that great anymore. Porsche is not Ferrari, they're not Koenigsegg. Maybe they used to be, but 5 years from now they're going to be roughly equivalent to Audi or BMW.

@Dweezil: Intangibles are for twerps in Boxters.

@matto

lol - Boxsters are referred to as 'the baby porsche' and 'not a true porsche'

@Dweezil
you make good points - but Porsche is still the "it" car in many social circles. and it's the #1 most profitable car co. in the world. and the everyday exotic. people still love it - alot, basically!

Porsche [www.911-Forum.com]

@lawrence: "The everyday exotic?" If you're being paid to post those links, you just cost Porsche your salary right there.

Lambo, yo!

Didn't I just post this? Meh, time to log onto RL.

+ Watch video

@raincoaster: Oh, great. Well, watch it twice then.

M5 that was the one Clarkson was a bit ambivelent about and it apparently takes 20 min to navigate through the cars interface to unlock the 500 BHP.

And EVO vs Porsche

Topgear powerlaps

Porsche Carerra GT 1.19.8
Mitsubishi Evo FQ400 1.24.8

Re: The video, those 1970s-era Panteras still hold up.

@Mouser_UK: The Carrera GT was a $400,000+ specially designed supercar that had little to nothing to do with any other Porsche. The FQ-400 was a limited British edition version of a cheap, Japanese sedan that looks like a toaster and cost 47,000 pounds. If anything, you just posted an example of why Porsche is no longer what it was.

@Mouser_UK: To be fair, Jeremy whinges about any user interface more modern than the dashboard of a '58 Sprite Bugeye.

@deathbychichi: What's funny is, that's not even the video I meant to post. THIS is the better video:

+ Watch video