Linux for beginners: what's with all the different linux flavors [duplicate]

Linux for beginners: what's with all the different linux flavors [duplicate]

I'm completely new to linux, and the first thing that confuses me is all the different flavors. There's Ubuntu, red hat, debian, mandrake, fedora, etc. Its all confusing to a complete linux noob. Could someone clear up the differences between and provide a nice "introduction to linux" talk? :D