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Comment by zeveb | Hacker News Reader

> I would be willing to bet that within a decade you HAPPILY buy a phone without a headphone jack, whether that be an Android or iPhone.

Is there a site we can legally use to register that bet? I'd be interested in taking it.

I honestly don't think that the headphone jack will ever go away. Wireless audio is like wireless internet, in that it's better than nothing but worse than something with wires and a stable connexion.

I daresay you're correct that Apple think they're right, but … I think they're wrong. The question is, can they remain irrational longer than the rest of the market can be rational? I _think_, given Android's market success, that they ultimately can't: Apple have made too many mistakes in too short a timespan.

But only time will tell.

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> Is there a site we can legally use to register that bet? I'd be interested in taking it.

http://longbets.org. Also the site Warren Buffet used to bet that he could beat hedge funds with the S&P 500.

That looks pretty cool, but requires one use one's real name. Any anonymous, legal long-term bet site? Sorry to raise the bar …

I was seriously considering switching to iPhone for my next phone after my S.O. had a terrible experience with Google customer support, but my car doesn't have Bluetooth. I don't plan on getting a new car for at least another 5 years, so if I want to listen to music in my car, iPhone is ruled out.

If it has a 3.5mm input socket, there are many Bluetooth to 3.5mm receivers that would work (like this TaoTronics TT-BA08 I'm using right now).

Obviously if you don't have a 3.5mm jack, that doesn't help.

Guess what, I switched, only I bought a 6s instead of a 7. It's not like you could pretend the 6s is a useless slab overnight.

If you're going to leave a cable in your car (I'm assuming that's the plan) just leave a lightning to 3.5mm cable.

Which the iPhone 7 handily comes with (and clones are readily available on Amazon although YMMV as to their quality, obvs.)

Why? My car doesn't have Bluetooth and my iPhone 7 works just fine, and charges while listening to music and everything. There are already headphone/charging splitters you can get on amazon made just for the 7 (though I'm still using the same setup as my 6).

You don't have to buy a new car to get a different radio. And if your car has a 3,5mm jacket (here we go! ;-), you could use the Chromecast Audio to cast to the car radio with your new iphone without that 3,5mm jacket.

You need a local wifi network for the CC, so you have to setup a wifi hotspot with your phone. Then you make the connection. The downside is that you cannot use car stereo buttons to skip to the next song. And you probably need double usb-charging for the CC and the phone. That's quite a lot of work to setup each and every drive, but for longer drives it might be a good option.

This still has the issue of not being able to use your car controls to control the music, but:

https://www.amazon.com/Antec-Portable-Bluetooth-Receiver-Hea...

Pair this with your phone, and plug it into power. When your car turns on, it powers on, pairs with your phone, and spits audio out over 3.5mm to the car stereo.

Comes with a 3.5mm male -> 3.5mm male plug for this purpose.

The SE still exists with a headphone jack and it doesn't look like an iPad held up to your head.

Maybe longbets? http://longbets.org/

I think they are legal, because the winnings doesn't go to the participants, but to a charity of the winners choosing.

Exactly correct! Long ago I wrote the LongBets software and am still involved in the Long Now, so I'm happy to facilitate registering a bet between people on this topic; just email me.

At this point we've been up for 14 years. If we're good enough for Warren Buffet's million-dollar bet [1], I'd say we can handle this bet too.

[1] http://longbets.org/362/

Any way to use a pseudonym? I'm happy to throw $200 bucks into the pot.

If you can find a counterparty and that's the only way to get the bet done, I'm glad to ask. But the theory of Long Bets is as a registry for accountable predictions. Accountability is tied to identity. So my guess is that they'd say yes for a well-known pseudonym with a body of work, like Lewis Carroll or Voltaire, but would say no for a throwaway name.

>I honestly don't think that the headphone jack will ever go away.

regardless of the claim, you are just setting yourself up for failure when you make unbound claims like that, nothing lasts forever.

I have been using a good pair of bluetooth headphones for over a year and am perfectly happy with them, Audio quality is never an issue with a2dp. Likewise after getting a decent 802.11ac router that provides stable 5GHz Wifi way faster than what my 100Mbps internet connection can provide, I haven't used wired ethernet for ages, apart from wiring my NAS to the router. 10 years is a long time, very sure the Audio Jack will be gone by then or a rarity like Vinyl today.

> Wireless audio is like wireless internet, in that it's better than nothing but worse than something with wires and a stable connexion

It depends on what factors you value. Wired beats wireless for reliability and speed. It gets crushed for convenience, though.

My home wireless is really spotty. I want to run Ethernet to several locations... in order to install more access points.

> Is there a site we can legally use to register that bet? I'd be interested in taking it.

I don't know of any website that let you place a bet like that, but you could probably place it at a bookmakers.

  > Wireless audio is like wireless internet, in
  > that it's better than nothing but worse than
  > something with wires and a stable connexion.

From my perspective, wired internet has effectively gone away. I haven't plugged anything other than a wireless router into a physical ethernet connection in years.

You obviously don't work in any kind of office. Wired Ethernet is still the norm for good reason: having hundreds or thousands of PCs in one building fighting over WiFi spectrum would be incredibly stupid and inefficient and slow.

It's getting problematic in the home as well.

In a startup now. Worked at a 800 person tech company 4 years ago. All laptops, all wireless (at least on my team -- I'm sure there were people that were plugged in somewhere).

Worked at a much larger tech company 1 year ago. Had a desktop that was plugged in, so there's that. Guess I overstated (though I can't say I actually did plug it in myself). Also had a laptop that I worked on over wireless without problems. There were 5k-10k people in that office.

Still I do almost everything over wireless.

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