What does robustness mean - not crashing?
Well coming from someone who's been using 3d Studio in production for years, robustness to me is more about stability, scalability and reliability. All things it currently suffers with to a degree when you really push the envelope. I think they are slowly addressing these issues bit by bit but they've long been a thorn in the side of VFX folks.
Maybe a Linux Port, or how about for starters putting a film section on discreet's MAX website?
I don't think a Linux port would make a huge difference at the moment, but I'm not against it. Unfortunately the MAX code isn't very portable. When it was initially written back in 1993 it was architecturally developed with deep integration/reliance on the Windows API. On the positive side this strategy has allowed for a small team to remain very focused on a single very common platform. On the negative side though it's going to require a complete redesign and rewrite to port it to multiple platforms. This also goes for 3rd party developers.
And regarding Discreet MAX marketing, yep it's not very focused. I tend to see the most impressive imagery coming from MAX from friends working in production.
But what about high-end particel effects, or other Vfx or character animation issues?
The core level particles have been obsolete for the last four years or so, but luckily there have been some very inexpensive 3rd party particle tools that have very nicely filled that gap. My personal favorite being a very fast and easy event-driven particle system called Particle Studio. Recently a new more powerful event-driven particle system was introduced called Thinking Particles which has features very similar to Houdini's POPs.
Right now, volumetrics are one of MAX's great VFX strengths. For years now it's had very advanced volumetrics available as sub-$500 plugins (Afterburn, Pyrocluster, UltraShock) or even freeware (Blur Fire, Firestorm, Dust Devil).
As for character tools, it still lags behind Soft and Maya, though MAX 4 finally added some production-worthy IK tools. The default Skinning tools are not mature yet, but there are a few 3rd party tools that fill the gap (though not as complete a solution as Maya or Soft's). Character Studio, with as much of a foostep-driven stigma as it gets, is really rather revolutionary. It's had IK/FK and NLA support for years now. The only limitation most people don't like have to do with a bipedal figures and lack of function curves. Still though, its clip-driven approach to NLA is so fast and easy to use that it's really best suited for speed and volume (ie episodic TV projects). I'm currently deep in production with CS3's new crowd system. It's by far the most advanced one I've used, though I suppose that doesn't say much. It's got a very visual workflow that incorporates scripting to control events at a deeper level than the general UI. And because it's all built around Biped and its NLA capabilities, it's really fast and easy to use (assuming you can manage MotionFlow networks).
Still with all those pros and cons, I really want to learn Houdini 
