Wow!
What a ride:
For you guys late to the game, we have just witnessed a Smash Crash, right out of the Goldman Sacks Playbook.
First, quietly buy some shares, enough to influence the stock. Wait for an opportune moment, say when a startup tech company misses a deadline by a few days or gives some ambiguous signals to the market....
Then, trumpet the significance of the event, trounce the reputation, blow everything out of proportion and make semi-rational arguments based on psuedo-logic.
Flood the media, make a new reddit channel or two, and have your army of "evil" sock puppets ready to go...
500 "evil" posts in a few hours should suffice....easy if you have a pocket cyber-army that just can't wait to try out their brand new custom made shiny toys...
Next, sell all your shares at any price. Don't worry you can buy them back cheaper in a few hours!
Now sit back and watch the show... feed the flames every so often just for fun...
After the crash, switch sock puppets to the "good" guys, and post some more...
and buy up the order book at your nice new low price...
whoo hooo, just like the big boys....