Editing Dot-com bubble (section)

==Aftermath==
{{See also|List of companies affected by the dot-com bubble}}
After venture capital was no longer available, the operational mentality of executives and investors completely changed. A dot-com company's lifespan was measured by its [[burn rate]], the rate at which it spent its existing capital. Many dot-com companies ran out of capital and went through [[liquidation]]. Supporting industries, such as advertising and shipping, scaled back their operations as demand for services fell. However, many companies were able to endure the crash; 48% of dot-com companies survived through 2004, albeit at lower valuations.<ref name=lessons/>

Several companies and their executives, including [[Bernard Ebbers]], [[Jeffrey Skilling]], and [[Kenneth Lay]], were accused or convicted of [[fraud]] for misusing shareholders' money, and the [[U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission]] levied large fines against investment firms including [[Citigroup]] and [[Merrill Lynch]] for misleading investors.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Ex-WorldCom CEO Ebbers found guilty on all counts – Mar. 15, 2005|url=https://money.cnn.com/2005/03/15/news/newsmakers/ebbers/|access-date=2021-06-20|website=[[CNN]]|archive-date=2018-07-03|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180703072335/http://money.cnn.com/2005/03/15/news/newsmakers/ebbers/|url-status=live}}</ref>

After suffering losses, retail investors transitioned their investment portfolios to more cautious positions.<ref>{{cite news |title=Hard Times Investing: For Some, Cash Is Everything And Only Thing |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2010/08/09/hard-times-investing-for-some-cash-is-everything-and-only-thing.html |first=Rob |last=Reuteman |work=[[CNBC]] |date=August 9, 2010 |access-date=September 9, 2017 |archive-date=May 25, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170525092042/http://www.cnbc.com/id/38308960 |url-status=live }}</ref> Popular [[Internet forum]]s that focused on [[high tech]] stocks, such as [[Silicon Investor]], [[Yahoo! Finance]], and [[The Motley Fool]] declined in use significantly.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB980897351252699393 |title=Raging Bull Goes for a Bargain As Interest in Stock Chat Wanes |first=Stacy |last=Forster |work=[[The Wall Street Journal]] |date=January 31, 2001 |access-date=December 9, 2018 |archive-date=December 9, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181209213157/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB980897351252699393 |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Job market and office equipment glut===
Layoffs of [[programmer]]s resulted in a [[general glut]] in the job market. University enrollment for computer-related degrees dropped noticeably.<ref>{{cite news |last=desJardins |first=Marie |title=The real reason U.S. students lag behind in computer science |url=https://fortune.com/2015/10/22/u-s-students-computer-science/ |work=[[Fortune (magazine)|Fortune]] |date=October 22, 2015 |access-date=February 10, 2020 |archive-date=March 7, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200307184124/https://fortune.com/2015/10/22/u-s-students-computer-science/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=After the Dot-Com Bubble: Silicon Valley High-Tech Employment And Wages in 2001 and 2008 |url=https://www.bls.gov/opub/regional_reports/200908_silicon_valley_high_tech.htm |first1=Amar |last1=Mann |first2=Tony |last2=Nunes |work=[[Bureau of Labor Statistics]] |year=2009 |access-date=2017-04-14 |archive-date=2018-11-16 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181116080237/https://www.bls.gov/opub/regional_reports/200908_silicon_valley_high_tech.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> [[Aeron chair]]s, which retailed for $1,100 each, were liquidated en masse.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://nymag.com/news/intelligencer/21364/ | title=Remembering the Dot-Com Throne | first=Brian | last=Kennedy | work=[[New York (magazine)|New York]] | date=September 15, 2006 | access-date=February 10, 2020 | archive-date=June 6, 2020 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200606014117/https://nymag.com/news/intelligencer/21364/ | url-status=live }}</ref>

===Legacy===
As growth in the technology sector stabilized, companies consolidated; some, such as [[Amazon.com]], [[eBay]], [[Nvidia]] and [[Google]], gained market share and came to dominate their respective fields. The most valuable public companies are now generally in the technology sector.{{citation needed|date=October 2024}}

In a 2015 book, venture capitalist [[Fred Wilson (financier)|Fred Wilson]], who funded many dot-com companies and lost 90% of his net worth when the bubble burst, said about the dot-com bubble:

{{Blockquote|A friend of mine has a great line. He says "Nothing important has ever been built without [[irrational exuberance]]." Meaning that you need some of this mania to cause investors to open up their pocketbooks and finance the building of the railroads or the automobile or aerospace industry or whatever. And in this case, much of the capital invested was lost, but also much of it was invested in a very high [[throughput]] backbone for the Internet, and lots of software that works, and databases and server structure. All that stuff has allowed what we have today, which has changed all our lives... that's what all this speculative mania built.<ref>{{cite news |title=Here's what the future of bitcoin looks like—and it's bright |url=https://venturebeat.com/2016/02/14/heres-what-the-future-of-bitcoin-looks-like-and-its-bright/ |first=Jacob |last=Donnelly |work=[[VentureBeat]] |date=February 14, 2016 |access-date=April 14, 2017 |archive-date=April 15, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170415200336/https://venturebeat.com/2016/02/14/heres-what-the-future-of-bitcoin-looks-like-and-its-bright/ |url-status=live }}</ref>}}