[randomknowledge]

"Individual programmers can contribute by writing a compatible duplicate of some Unix utility and giving it to me. For most projects, such part-time distributed work would be very hard to coordinate; the independently-written parts would not work together. But for the particular task of replacing Unix, this problem is absent. Most interface specifications are fixed by Unix compatibility. If each contribution works with the rest of Unix, it will probably work with the rest of GNU."

This stood out to me. Back in 1983 online collaboration was unheard of, and it was only the incredibly modular nature of Unix which made the project seem at all plausible.

[fsck--off]

> Back in 1983 online collaboration was unheard of

Not really. Stallman mentioned Chaosnet which the AI Lab had used for, among other things, internal mail (not yet called "e-mails") between developers about changes to programs. He also mentions UUCP, which was the godawful Unix way of sharing files (and which could be used for mail purposes).

[aryastark]

This is really, IMO, why no new community OS has ever taken off. Only clones of existing architectures. I was briefly involved with TUNES many years ago. Getting people on the same page is an immense task, when creating something new and different. You get stuck in the bike shed tar pit. Focusing on a well-specified Unix clone was definitely the right thing to do.