TECH Signal 491
"The original URL for this prediction will no longer be available in 11 years." (2011)
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Illustration only Photo by Brad Helmink on Unsplash
A 2011 Long Bets prediction wagered whether the URL www.longbets.org/601 would still resolve by 2022, testing whether web addresses can survive link rot over an 11-year span.
Link rot undermines any system that treats URLs as stable references, from documentation links to API endpoints. The bet's resolution criteria, allowing 301 redirects as valid survival, reveals that persistence requires only identifier continuity, not infrastructure permanence.
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Jeremy Keith predicted the URL would not survive 11 years, treating link rot as inevitable entropy on the web.
Matthew Haughey countered that mature web technology and redirect strategies make stable URIs achievable with moderate effort.
The bet's terms accepted 301 redirects as fulfillment, meaning the original server or hosting could change entirely and the URL would still count as available.
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