It’s strange, but the 3 day poop challenge meme that swept through lemmy the other day reminded me of what Reddit used to be. It felt like an actual community where people were actually interacting, and sometimes bizarre posts turned into legends. I hadn’t noticed the slow transition to just endless bot reposts. With all the spez drama, i decided Reddit was dead to me, and that was sad to acknowledge the sudden end of an era like that. But lemmy showed me that the things that made me love Reddit have been gone for a long time, and I feel more at home here.
First thing that comes to mind is Lamborghini which would not exist today if it were not acquired. It was on the verge of bankruptcy and ended up getting passed around a few times before being acquired by Volkswagen/Audi. I think the general consensus is that access to Audi’s technology brought some sophistication in the form of AWD, traction and stability control, and a bump in quality and reliability. I know they only make obscenely expensive cars that few people ever get to enjoy, but they were able to maintain a headquarters and factory in Italy with a few thousand employees which would have definitely shut down without the acquisition.
Edit: On the topic of cars, another example would be Red Bull Racing which originated as a small F1 team started in the 90s. It was bought by Ford and rebranded to Jaguar F1. Ford didn’t have much success with it, so they sold the whole team to Red Bull for $1. Red Bull went on to dominate from 2010 to 2013 and again from 2021 to present day.