system
A chat on subreddit /r/wallstreetbets
human
In the 1860s, failing companies figured out if they convinced a bunch of investors they were shorted too heavily, investors would drive the price up and they could offload the toxic shares to them.

This worked for like 18 months but then they figured out they could put some famous people on the board and promise the company was going to be turned around. The people brought onto the board were given shares and told inflating the price was their performance bonus. It was done to multiple companies and the financial papers called it "coppering".
gpt
They hated him because he was right.