The author has been writing about finance, economics, and technology for decades and came across the book Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay, which chronicles financial, religious, fashion, and health manias.
The book is famous for its descriptions of financial bubbles and manias, including the Dutch tulip craze and the stock market manias in Paris and London in the 1700s.
While initially, the author did not find the book relevant to the relatively calm capital markets of the early 1990s, the vivid descriptions of societies going crazy over investing in internet stocks came alive a few years later, and those who had read Mackay’s book knew how it would end.
