If the auto industry had taken the computer industry as its model, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics:

1. For no reason whatsoever your car would crash twice a day.

2. If you tried to execute a maneuver your car didn’t like, it would shut down and refuse to restart until you reinstalled the engine.

3. Only one person at a time could use the car unless you bought “CarNT”

4. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast, and twice as easy to drive—but it would only run on 5% of the roads.

5. The airbag system would ask, “Are you sure?” before deploying.

6. Occasionally, for no apparent reason, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the antenna.

7. GM would require all car buyers to purchase a deluxe set of Rand McNally road maps (now a GM subsidiary), even though drivers never needed nor wanted them. Any attempt on the driver’s part to delete this option would immediately cause the car’s performance to diminish by 50% or more. Moreover, GM would become a target for investigation by the Justice Department.

8. Every time GM introduced a new model, car buyers would have to learn to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

9. You’d have to press the “start” button to turn off the engine.