Well that's actually a deeper question than you might think.
First answer: This was just a test rocket and they had to test cargo and a car is more fun to send up than cement.
This rocket is the largest rocket in history and is designed to carry up to 64 tons into space. It is meant to be the vehicle which is used to get men to Mars and material for a permanent science station on the moon. It is incredibly cheap (90 million versus around 1 billion for NASA rocket) compared to other rockets of similar output but it had to be tested. They didn't want to put anything expensive on it in case it blew up, so Elon Musk volunteered his first Tesla roadster as a test cargo. This test rocket was successful but there were some failures. The middle rocket didn't re-land correctly. The last burn put the car's orbit into the asteroid belt instead of just outside Mars's orbit. But overall it was a huge success.
Second answer: This is a massive publicity stunt for both Tesla and Spacex both of which are mostly owned and run by Elon Musk.
This has been massive publicity for all of Elon's major companies. Elon is the pre-eminent promoter of solar power, electric cars and space exploration on the planet and this event allowed him to highlight all 3 of them at once on an international stage. Genius marketing.
Third answer: This may have been the greatest sci-fi geek performance art piece in the history of the earth. It will be remembered forever.
What sci-fi addicted kid doesn't want to blow a car into space? Elon Musk was a huge sci-fi kid. He apparently read Asimov's foundation series by the age of 13 (Al Gore, Carl Sagan and Paul Krugman along with numerous other researchers and scientists have said they were also influenced by the series). Other sci-fi references in the launch include the 'Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy' (there's a copy of the book alongside a towel in the glove box plus the 'Don't Panic' quote), the move 'Heavy Metal's' orbital car scene and David Bowie's 'Space Oddity' song 'Life on Mars'. Elon clearly had a wish to show his geek side and NO ONE will up this amount of "Geek" for a long, long time. It was both utterly unique and full of familiar references to millions of sci-fi fans world wide.
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u/Claeyt Feb 07 '18
Why what? Why include the HGTTG stuff? or why launch it?