Linux as the future kernel of Mac OS

Apple's newly acquired OS, NeXTstep was built on the Mach 3.0 kernel, the same microkernel used by GNU/Hurd. Though by then the Mach kernel was largely abandoned, another kernel, Linux, was gaining support and seeing rapid development. The project at Carnegie Mellon to develop Mach had ended in 1994, two years before Apple acquired NeXT. As early as 1991 papers were published documenting performance issues with the Mach kernel. At the time there was much debate over kernel design, 1992 marked the now famous flame war between Linus Torvalds and Andy Tanenbaum over monolithic vs. microkernel design. Even though Apple got Mach from NeXTstep, it still remained to be seen what kernel Apple would use for their new OS. The higher-level pieces of NeXTstep, such as the Objective-C frameworks, had already been ported to other operating systems in the form of OPENSTEP. Apple's future was not tied to the Mach kernel and other options were being considered.

I'll just quote the first couple of responses this screed has gotten on Digg:

Lame and seriously inaccurate; the XNU microkernel is under continuous development by Apple themselves, that should be a no brainer.
Apple had their pick of Kernels with the fundamental tenant that the kernel they picked was something they had absolute control over, not something that some community had some control over and One Developer that's regarded as a God amonst that community has the ability to change at his whim. Not to mention the fact that the "benevolent dictator" of said project refuses to stablize the API; API/ABI Stability is the paramount neccesity for an operating system that is commercially distributed, it needs to be predictable to the tee under any configuration.
So no, Linux was never an option. The Mach microkernel was already being used in NextStep's implementation (Rhapsody), FreeBSD provided the rest of the patchwork bits they needed, and everything was licensed in a way that Apple could control. Thusly, XNU + FreeBSD became Darwin, and Darwin + Cocoa + Aqua = Mac OS X.
Just because there's another option growing, doesn't mean it's the only option.

Yep. Lame, inaccurate, and headline is misleading.

'Nuff said.

Misleading -- yes the Linux kernel interface (API and ABI) changes over time. But that doesn't stop commercial distribution. The commercial distributors such as Novell (SuSE) and Red Hat stabilize the kernel and release and support commercial versions. Meanwhile the kernel maintained by the community of Linux kernel developers continues forward.

That's essential to Linux having such a wide penetration, literally from cell phones to some of the worlds largest 512 CPU supercomputers -- it can keep evolving.

By the way, did you know that the DOS 3.0 API/ABI was such a success that Microsoft has not changed it since, and still uses it, unchanged and unextended, today at the base of Windows XP? Well, actually I am speaking sarcastically. This is blatantly not true.

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