While nobody can accurately predict the future, that never stops folks from trying. Making a calculated guess—the more calculated, the better—increases the chances, but there’s still a non-zero chance of it being wrong. But, boy, is it particularly satisfying to hit the bull’s eye with a prediction!

Online, this phenomenon is appropriately called aging like wine. It pertains to posting something about the future and turning out to be right about it. In fact, there’s a whole group dedicated to celebrating this phenomenon called r/agedlikewine.

#1 Is It Wine Or Milk? Can’t Quite Tell

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#2 This Sadly Aged Well

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#3 Well, He Ain’t Wrong

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So, r/agedlikewine is a subreddit that’s all about “things that have stood the test of time”. This includes everything from social media posts to newspaper excerpts to news headlines to videos speculating about stuff.

The subreddit was created at the end of 2018, and as of this listicle, the subreddit has nearly 195,000 members.

#4 The Real Eternals

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#5 They’re Not Too Far Off Tbh

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#6 Not Fully Aged Yet, But Relevant To The News

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Everything that ends up being true in the end—one, two, five, whatever—years later, ends up on this subreddit. And everything that turns out to be false or worse—redonkulously wrong—gets thrown into r/agedlikemilk.

This subreddit is the genetic antithesis of r/agedlikewine. And, it seems, it’s celebrated even more as it’s home to 1.2 million members, despite being created just three months before its wine counterpart.

#7 I Downloaded This On 1/1/2020… Not Thrilled It Came True

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#8 When Your Old Funny Tweet Turns Out To Be Prophecy…

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#9 How Right You Were, Marge

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To give you a taste of what sort of content constitutes as quality wine-grade post, try some of these on for size:

Someone predicted that Netflix will crack down on shared accounts. Someone predicted that Chris Rock will get a handful of Will Smith. Someone predicted that video games will cost $70. That last one was actually from The Simpsons, which is a whole other story when it comes to predictions.

#10 This Pandemic Xbox Review From 2019

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#11 I Saw This Meme At The Start Of The Pandemic

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#12 Touché, Past Self

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The most hilariously notorious example of aging like wine is more or less the entirety of The Simpsons. If you’ve been a fan of the show for long enough, you’ll know just how many things it has managed to predict across its 34 (as of this article) seasons.

It predicted at least two US presidents, The Higgs boson, murder hornets, the horse meat scandal, smart watches, the Capitol riots, and a bunch more. Either that, or someone was taking notes.

#13 Mobile Phones Predicted In 1963

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#14 Guess I Got What I Asked For

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#15 1979 Advertisement For London Transit Showing How The City Would Look If Built By American Planners

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Some might argue that The Simpsons predictions are more likely off-hand gags that coincidentally came true, or examples of human nature patterns that were referenced as a joke.

Some of these examples might just be designed to feel like predictions, but in reality rely on people’s confirmation bias rather than what the show’s writers actually meant.

#16 1950’s Ad Accurately Predicts Voice Commands

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#17 A Comment I Left On The Kid Laroi’s First Youtube Video 2 Years Ago When He Just Started Doing Music, He Is Now #1 On The Top 100 Charts And Has Songs With Artists Like Justin Beiber

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#18 Hunter S. Thompson One Week After 9/11

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Collider discussed this, providing the example taken from a Simpsons episode from 1995—the one with Lisa’s wedding. It’s said to have predicted smart watches. However, if we go back 30 years prior, we see wrist communicators being used in the Get Smart comedy series. Same goes with a video telephone featured in Back To The Future Part II from 1989, just 6 years prior.

#19 This Cartoon Was Drawn In 1912, 1 Year Before The Creation Of The Federal Reserve

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#20 Great Actor

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#21 I Made A Prediction For Climbing In The Olympics Several Years Ago That Finally Came True

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The whole future prediction kinda sorta ties in with the chemistry of being right. As being right about stuff can be addictive. The reason why we enjoy it is because the brain rewards us for doing that. Hence, some people flat out refuse to accept reality.

Whenever a person argues with someone, the brain floods the body with the good stuff—adrenaline, dopamine, all that jazz—which makes them feel great, dominant, nearly invincible. And the desire to replicate this feeling pushes folks to fight more next time.

#22 This Line From The Show Community

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#23 Maybe One Day

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#24 U/Digitaldesign17 Predicted Fyre Festival Would Be A S**t Show 2 Weeks Before It Started

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Amidst all the discussions of the two extremes—wine and milk, aging in their own way—there’s also another take on it: aging like anything else that’s more appropriate.

There’s a humorous New Yorker Daily Shout titled Things I Am Actually Aging Like, Instead of a Fine Wine, which gives wittily spot-on explanations of what the authors Lana Schwartz and Karl Spurzem age like that I find all too relatable.

#25 Damnit Apollo

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#26 A Couple Years Later And Here We Are, Like A Fine Bourbon

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#27 Popular Mechanics Magazine In March 1912 Hypothesizing That Raising Atmospheric Co2 May Considerably Increase Temperature “In A Few Centuries”

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In it, they explain that their aging is actually more akin to “that three-dollar wine from Trader Joe’s” as it’s “growing more acidic by the day.” Or “the New York City subway system” as folks should “expect delays on nights and weekends.” Or my personal favorite, aging like “the ocean: salty and containing microscopic bits of plastic.”

#28 Well

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#29 Noticed This Comment In A Thread About Nuclear Weapons

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#30 Aged Like Italian Wine?

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If you didn’t get your fill of aged wine or posts that aged like wine, there’s more where that came from, brought to you by Bored Panda. But before you do that, be sure to hit that upvote button on the article and the submissions you enjoyed the most. And why not give the comment section a good raid with witty commentary, suggestions on what else aged like wine, or speculations as to why it’s wine and not other drinks that get better with age?

#31 Main Plot Twist Of Pokémon Legends Arceus Predicted 6 Months Earlier

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#32 (No Way Home Spoilers) Not Bad At All

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#33 Inshallah Anon

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#34 A Profit Prophet

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#35 Well It Happened

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#36 Title

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#37 It Sure Does

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#38 Grimes Loves The Communist Manifesto

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#39 I Somehow Predicted Denmark Reaching The Euro Semis

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#40 This Guy Predicted The Setting Of Bioshock 4 Nearly Two Years Before It Was Leaked

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Source: boredpanda.com