It's simply a joke about Emacs having a long history. Don't take it too seriously. Just like the "greatest thing since sliced bread" phrase. I mean sliced bread is not great at all.

You've clearly not had to make a sandwich with bread that isn't sliced. Sliced bread is amazing.

I rarely buy sliced bread. But then again I usually buy real bread and not that "toast"-thing, which seems to be mislabelled as "bread" in the anglosphere.

I can't believe I'm witnessing a bread elitist. Bread, of all things.

Not knocking your opinion as I will admit to being a bread plebeian, but wow.

I can't believe you've not met a bread elitist before. Any European who isn't British or Irish would probably count...

My housemates (in London) are from Palestine, Poland, Romania and Hungary, and in average British terms all count as bread elitists. None can understand why the squashy, tasteless, white bread is popular here, and struggle to understand why people would buy crap bread, of all things!

A chinese person recently asked me: "In America, does the bread usually contain other things, or is it just bread?"

To understand the question, you need to know that if you buy a bread product in a Chinese bakery, there will be some sort of filling -- beans, a hot dog, anything -- hidden in the middle (well, a hot dog will usually stick out visibly on either side).

When I replied that bread is bread all the way through, there was a followup question: "If it's all just bread, how can one bread be different from another bread?"

It was hard to know how to respond. Different breads taste different. Some are high-quality, some are low. People aren't just imagining the difference between sourdough and wonderbread.

I grew up worshiping the Wonderbread kids, now I cringe in horror. There really is no comparison between real bread and the other stuff. It's kind of like Velveeta.

Velveeta's great if you want a cheese that melts smoothly.

Anyone who has ever eaten home made bread, the kind my grandmother used to make, would agree with the bread elitist!

The sentiment is more appropriate when talking about expensive liquid bread.

A lot of my relatives live oversees and most of them, every time they come home, buy a lot of bread, take it back to another country and store in a freezer. Because it's nearly impossible to find a good, tasty bread in most western countries (from my personal experience: UK, Denmark, Norway; but I've heard the problem is much wider).

Especially bread. It's a staple food in many cultures. It's an important item. Why should we not demand high quality? Where I'm from people eat good bread. I grew up with good bread. It is really interesting but also sad, that the anglosphere seems to lack a decent bread culture.

homemade bread that you tear into pieces with your hands, is clearly the best. Only lazy people have buy pre-sliced bread.

Feature Request: M-x slice-bread

I can see the editor wars starting now:

"Emacs gives you everything, including sliced bread!"

"Vim gives you a knife."

Have you guys ever heard of knives?

It's not the same thing, really. Freshly baked bread is awesome. Eating freshly baked bread without slicing it = priceless.

Actually, I prefer to make sandwiches from rolls. It's nice if they come sliced, but it's trivial to slice them yourself.

<vim user here> What did you expect from an operating system disguised as an editor? </vim user here>

Jokes apart IMHO the only editor comparable to VIM is Emacs :-)