Many of these comments make it seem like people back then didn't realize it was a bubble. I beg to differ. I sold my first startup to a publicly traded compan

Many of these comments make it seem like people back then didn't realize it was a bubble. I beg to differ. I sold my first startup to a publicly traded company in 1999, in an all-stock deal. I remember thinking back then that we were definitely in a bubble, and there was no way it was going to last. The big question was how long it could keep going. I sold the startup for 10x what I thought it was worth, knowing that the market would probably crash before my stock became free-trading (there was a 1 year hold). Lo and behold, the market crashed about 3 weeks before my stock became freely trading, I lost 75% of my net worth. It was pretty devastating, but I still made out with more than I expected. So, the whole point of this story was to tell you that - at least for me and a lot of people I knew, we all knew it was all a big bubble. The question was how long the irrationality could keep going.