> if you noticed that everyone was buying the wrong Zoom and decided to profit from their stupidity by selling ZOOM short, then (1) you have done poorly

When short-selling, I believe people either know very well what they're doing (and they're using it as a "building block" into a bigger transaction) or they really don't have a clue and are just acting on a "hunch". I believe 90% of people are in the latter group.