Birth of a bubble: Web 1.0

It was the best of times in Northern Colorado. Unemployment was virtually nonexistent, the country had emerged largely unscathed by the Asian financial crisis, stock portfolios were skyrocketing and the party of a lifetime – promised for almost two decades by the artist then-as-now known as Prince – was almost here.

By all accounts, business was good in 1999. A general sense of invincibility built over the year, particularly in the technology sector. Offshoring was not yet a part of the tech industry lingo, and while the dreaded Y2K computer glitch caused a yearlong frenzy of seemingly superfluous preparation, it…