At some point in time people will link to stack overflow, forum or similar support articles that are over 100 years old.

whaleross , 7 months ago

The mods will by then be replaced with bots that remove every new question by default because it was probably answered like 65 years ago and if not it’s not a good question.

agent_flounder , 7 months ago

Probably rare. I guess occasionally people link to old usenet posts…

Somehow, C will still be around.

Sabata11792 , 7 months ago

When you bump a 100 year old thread because the only answer was some guy telling OP to use different software.

agent_flounder , 7 months ago

Maybe if science extends our lives substantially, the original poster will respond.

rem26_art , 7 months ago

Im sure people will still be using Java 8 then, so its fine

TootSweet , 7 months ago

Plus all the questions about java.util.Date will still be relevant in Java version 100.

Hell. They may even undeprecate java.util.Date .

TheFriendlyDickhead , 7 months ago

And every single bank will still use COBOL

taiyang , 7 months ago

People are doubtful, but I read a post on Gamefaqs from like, 25 years ago and they went through plenty of enshittification. I look forward to sharing the ancient texts with my great grandkids on how to get the best sword in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.

funkajunk , 7 months ago

As AI keeps progressing, it’s more than likely that humans will no longer code anything in the near future.

You’ll start a conversation with your AI, describe what you are trying to achieve, and the AI can write and debug code faster and better than you ever could.

douglasg14b , 7 months ago

You’re down voted, but you’re right.

Naysayers are looking at AI capabilities today. Not AI capabilities in 10-20 years.

AI accelerates AI development/advancement.

agent_flounder , 7 months ago

At some point AI will be able to train itself, improvise, and even experiment with solutions to find the optimal ones. I wonder how long it will take.

ArbitraryValue , 7 months ago

Unlikely, even if there isn’t an AI-related end of history. How often do you read anything over a hundred years old, outside of English class? Have you ever read a technical document over a hundred years old in your life?

InfiniWheel , 7 months ago

Given some software is still dependent on stuff written like 20 years ago, it wouldn’t surprise me if even a small part of some future program relies on century old code

1rre , 7 months ago

We (in much of Europe at least) rely on train lines and sewers laid out over 100 years ago and we refer to plans made then, so I think there’s a high chance there’s software around in 100 years which still works so never gets replaced (or gets upgraded but is the same at the core, I bet windows still has task manager barely modified)

douglasg14b , 7 months ago

… Maps?

Plat maps, land use maps, survey maps…etc can date to the early 1900’s and late 1800’s. Preserved & converted to digital form for country-side USGIS visualizations and mapping.

Or architectural blueprints, or sewer/water line diagrams/maps. Electrical & communication lines are approaching that age. Transportation infrastructure and diagrams.

We reference documents & technical knowledge that’s 30-50 years old, sometimes 70-80 years old right now in our industry. Mathematics knowledge that’s well over 100 years old.

There are countless examples of important things that are as old as the industry itself.

It’s essentially guaranteed that we will be referencing technical documentation and design and knowledge that is over 100 years old once this industry is old enough.

snooggums , 7 months ago

A lot of people still read the Bible and other religious texts outside of English class.

People still read a lot of classics.

Tons of legal documents, laws that haven't changed, and other bureaucratic documentation is still referenced regularly.

Pretty sure there are architecture plans for things like the Hoover Dam that are still used for making maintenance decisions.

Historians sure look back at old documents, not to mention people who do genealogy and other family history stuff.

While the average person may not actively seek out old text because new content on the internet is the current hotness, there is still a ton of information that people who are working jobs or doing research need that is over a century old and that is the kind of information that is comparable to something like stack overflow. It will more likely be copied and retained through something like archive.org than the original website, but as long as there is a chance that someone might need it or someone has retaining it as a hobby, it will still be around.

WashedOver , 7 months ago

I have to wonder the medium we will be using then. Will it be a heads up display in our eyes by then?

agent_flounder , 7 months ago

Maybe we will just share a hive mind, Borg-style.

perviouslyiner , 7 months ago

And The Art of Computer Programming will finally be finished?

AbouBenAdhem , 7 months ago

More likely that AI will be answering questions drawing on training sets containing forum posts that are over 100 years old.

DrQuint , 7 months ago

The AI: “Question marked as duplicate.”

jol , 7 months ago

Doubt it. The way Web companies work, they eventually enter an entshitification phase and then die out. Zero chance stackoverflow last until the end of the century.

tdawg , 7 months ago

OP said “even if it’s an archived version.” But sure continue to push your emotional state onto an otherwise unrelated conversation

TheTetrapod , 7 months ago

Who downvoted this? The person you replied to didn’t read the post.

nxdefiant , 7 months ago

I used to work for a very old company that still has digitized copies of many, if not most, of its oldest records available for reference. It was surreal looking at internal technical documentation for things that stopped existing 50 years ago

ivanafterall , 7 months ago

Only if people are still around in 100 years.