You are right. Besides the obvious they do or used to do construction, construction equipment, movie and entertainment, digital agency, fabric, food, military weapons, insurance, amusement park.
lol, samsung is worth a third of what Amazon is worth. Apple could buy Samsung. Samsung is a big company, but Google, Microsoft, amazon, and Apple are in a whole different league
It depends on big and how you define it. For instance Samsung has getting on for three times as many employees as Apple. Plus they actually make stuff rather than just get some other company to do it for them.
The stock market values companies precisely because they don't have the liability of employees that make stuff. Personally I value companies that do.
In the past, single companies have undermined governments and had fleets of ships that would put the navy of large nations to shame, all to sell bananas.
There was a company in the past which, for all intents and purposes was the government of an entire subcontinent. The East India Company rule in India effectively began in 1757 and lasted until 1858.
In some ways companies are like little dictatorships that are super efficient with their "taxes" (income/profit) so it's not that hard to see how they could outgrow and outmaneuver an inefficient democracy.
The internet is (usually and unfortunately), only text. There are no facial cues, hand gestures, etc. I, like I imagine a lot of people, can't easily detect sarcasm in text unless it's extremely over the top. And even then .. sometimes I have to wonder.
Sarcasm has to be the least effective way to communicate anyone could choose to use. You’re begging to be misunderstood and quoted as an idiot by using sarcasm these days.
You're right for online conversations or around people you don't know. Within friends groups or people that know you well (long-time coworkers) it's an effective tool, at least in my experience.
The hard part is not getting taken out of context by someone that overhears your conversations, so you should still exercise caution.
