Dot-coms ceased being sure stock market winners—at first in a trickle, and then all at once. Falling stock prices turned into stock market delistings and then became actual bankruptcies. Like any good game of musical chairs, when the music stopped, there simply weren’t enough seats for everyone. As investors suddenly began to demand that companies show a profit for the first time, the collective response from the dot-coms was “What? You can’t be serious!”
