Every case

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• Squid Game turns Korean children's games into a debt satire — Netflix's biggest show ever2008–2021
• AfreecaTV turns eating alone into a live show — mukbang becomes a global genre2008–2021
• KFC China makes Genshin fans shout a cringe code for badges — the shame sells the meal2021
• Atlassian's ShipIt: 24-hour quarterly hackathons since 2005 birthed Jira Service Desk2005–2021
• Mixue's 13-word ice-cream anthem goes viral — 9.5 billion exposures for Snow King2021
• Zalando's 'Here To Stay' turns its spring moment into a stand for values2020
• WWF Germany names a new deep-sea species after the plastic found inside it2020
• DoorDash's animated 'Flavourhood' campaign helped it become Canada's top food delivery app2020
• BMW China's 'ba ma wo' New Year film reunites a family through renamed initials2020
• Paname Brewing turns lockdown-stranded beer into Immortal Jellyfish Gin2020
• Telfar's Bag Security Program swaps scarcity drops for made-to-order bags2020
• Coca-Cola's 'Hear This Ad' stills make viewers hear the sound of opening a Coke2019–2020
• Animal Crossing: New Horizons runs on real time and is Switch's fastest seller2020
• Carlsberg Malaysia fills a virtual keg at home that pays out free beer when bars reopen2020
• Tinder's 'Swipe Night' turns matching into an interactive apocalypse story2019–2020
• Bad News vaccinates players against fake news by making them tycoons of it2018–2020
• Denmark Heart Runner app alerts the nearest citizens before ambulances arrive2017–2020
• Noita made every pixel a simulation, then wrapped it in a roguelike2007–2020
• Song Exploder makes the isolated audio stems the interview — one song, layer by layer2014–2020
• Pret's £20-a-month coffee subscription: five barista drinks a day, first month free2020
• usb-hubs.org: a filterable spec layer on top of Amazon's messy USB-C hub listings2020
• Tweet Photo's 'via tweet.photo' tag turned users into ads — then sold for $30k2017–2020
• Tailwind CSS: a dead side project's leftover styles become a $4M business2015–2020
• Solo dev ships StoryCreatorApp, an 'After Effects for dummies', to 868 HN points2019–2020
• New Relic open-sources every agent and keeps New Relic One as the paid product2020
• Frame Labs' ArtFrame e-paper picture frame runs for years on one battery charge2020
• Micro-mitten tests compile-time garbage collection without Rust's ownership rules2020
• DuckDuckGo: profitable search ads targeted at the query, not the person2014–2020
• Autonomy stress-tests 50,000 UK firms to sell the full-pay four-day week (2020)2020
• Arnest's butter grater knife turns fridge-cold butter into noodles that spread2020
• ScrapingBee pays prospects 10,000 API calls for a 15-minute research call2019–2020
• Guzzle uses food as a springboard for bigger ideas across three illustrated issues2020s
• Half-Life: Alyx's Gravity Gloves turn VR grabbing into a flick-to-catch superpower2016–2020
• Universal debuts Trolls World Tour at home for $19.99 — cinemas boycott, PVOD era begins2020
• Amazon's two-pizza rule: autonomous teams small enough for two pizzas2002–2020s
• Tongrentang turns its 351-year-old pharmacy into goji-latte 'Zhima Health' cafés2019–2020
• Lemonade's flat fee + Giveback makes unclaimed premiums charity, not profit2016–2020
• ClassPass credits price each fitness class by demand, filling studios' empty seats2013–2020
• Grillo's Pickles: fresh pickles in clear tubs grow a Boston cart to $1M2008–2020
• Terrace House: Fuji TV's drama-free reality format becomes Netflix's global hit2012–2020
• Nissin's Hungry Days ages anime icons into teens — Cup Noodle as the snack of youth2017–2020
• Fevicol turns 'the bond will not break' into decades of comedy — till it meant glue1990s–2020s
• Three Squirrels' 'master' persona turns snack-buying into roleplay — 7 Singles' Day wins2012–2020
• Emart names its private label 'No Brand' — the anti-brand Korea fell for2015–2020
• Durex China's Weibo turns a taboo brand into a witty person — No.1 since 20112011–2020
• YOASOBI turns web novels into hit songs, opening the no-CD era2019–2020
• Nizi Project launches NiziU by broadcasting the group's creation2019–2020
• Love Has No Labels' X-ray PSA wins the first Emmy ever for a public service ad2015–2020
• Pinboard (2009): a one-man bookmarking site stays small, paid and profitable2009–2020
• Wen's Food turns a million JD reviews into 'poems to meat' in a Shanghai wet market2020
• Klarna funds smooth checkout by billing merchants, not shoppers — pay later, get paid now2005–2020
• Haval names its new SUV 'Dargo' after a 32,525-vote netizen poll2020
• Børns Vilkår places 500 empty school chairs outside Denmark's Parliament on opening day2019–2020
• MasterClass: celebrities teach online — $90-a-class becomes a $180-a-year subscription2015–2020
• Xtep (特步) holds Shaolin's first show at its 1,500-year-old gate — 700M+ exposures2020
• JD's 'running chicken' must walk 1M steps before sale — verifiable free-range meat2016–2020
• Kamikatsu's 45-category sorting makes zero waste a town identity — 81% recycled by 20202003–2020
• Family Romance: renting out fake fathers, spouses and friends becomes a Tokyo business2009–2020
• Australia's Donation Dollar, the first coin built to be donated — ADFEST Grande2020
• Pop Mart's Molly Blind Box Sold Out in 4s on Tmall2016–2020
• MUD Jeans leases denim for €5 a month — ownership becomes a circular-fashion service2013–2020
• Samsung's Sero TV rotates vertical for mobile-first viewing — Seoul 2019, global 20202019–2020
• NEIWAI 2020 film: 6 women, body diversity, self-acceptance2020
• Kuaishou 9th Anniversary Film 'Seeing': 'Aoligei' Uncle Pays Tribute to Ordinary People2020
• Hakuhodo coined 'sei-katsu-sha' in 1981, starting Japan's planning philosophy.1981–2020s
• GitHub 2011–2020: Hubot turns chat into the deploy console2011–2020
• DingTalk turned bad reviews into a guichu song, topping Bilibili2020
• bilibili 2019 New Year's Eve Gala: 80M Viewers, Market Cap Up 12.5%2019–2020
• Baremetrics publishes its own revenue live and turns transparency into growth2014–2020
• Among Us: a 2018 party game becomes 2020's most-played game via Twitch streamers2018–2020
• StageCraft: The Mandalorian shoots half its scenes inside a real-time LED world2018–2020
• GT's Kombucha: a teenager's home brew creates the bottled kombucha category1995–2020
• Ctrip's BOSS livestream: chairman Liang sells hotels in costume — ¥1.1B GMV in 4 months2020
• Jackbox makes the phone the controller — the party game format that took over quarantine2014–2020
• Fiverr 2010: a flat $5 price turns digital odd jobs into a gig marketplace2010–2020
• Wufangzhai's 'Find a Friend' ads make collabs a child's dream — Wufang Studios is born2020
• Meituan's rider 'kangaroo ears' turn delivery helmets into a national meme2018–2020
• Epic gives Unreal Engine 4 away free — 5% royalty only after $3,000 a product2015–2020
• Mubi streams 30 curated films at a time, adding one a day — scarcity is the offer2007–2020
• iQiyi's Misty Theater brands short suspense dramas — 68M members watched2020
• IDEO's seven brainstorming rules turn idea sessions from critique into quantity1990s–2020s
• NetEase Yanxuan 'quits' Double 11 with anti-consumption PR — 1B exposures for under ¥50K2020
• Wuling's 'stall-economy van' goes viral — Wuling Motors shares jump 120% in a day2020
• Morning Brew turns a college email into a $75M newsletter business2015–2020
• Menlo Innovations runs a software firm on pair programming: new partner every week2001-2020
• Moldy Whopper: Burger King films its burger rotting 34 days, sweeps 18 One Show Golds2020
• Outer Wilds makes knowledge the only progression — a 22-minute loop wins BAFTA Best Game2012–2020
• Love Is Blind dates singles sight unseen in pods — 30M households in a month2018–2020
• Muji's 1980 'no-brand quality goods': 40 anonymous products start a 1,400-store idea1980–2020s
• The Voice's blind auditions judge voice before image — the format that circled the globe2010–2020
• Untitled Goose Game casts the player as a horrible goose — 1M copies in three months2019–2020
• Cereal Killer Café (2014): a London café selling only cereal — queues, outrage, expansion2014–2020
• Yakult's 1963 Yakult Ladies sell the science door-to-door — trust becomes the channel1963–2020s
• Stockholm's 1957 art-every-station program creates the world's longest gallery1957–2020s
• Naver's Webtoon redraws comics as a phone scroll — 170M monthly readers by 20242004–2020s
• Hades turns the roguelike death loop into the story engine — and sells a million copies2018–2020
• Travis Scott plays a concert inside Fortnite — 12.3M people attend live2020
• GetCalFresh cuts California's food-stamp application from 45 minutes to 102013–2019
• Sayonara Wild Hearts: Simogo makes an action game that plays like a pop album2018–2019
• Nintendo Labo turns Switch software into cardboard Toy-Cons kids build first2018–2019
• PayPay gives away ¥10 billion in cashback to jump-start Japan's QR payment habit2018–2019
• KFC Hong Kong builds its flames from fried chicken to sell Hot & Spicy2018–2019
• German Rail shows Germans the look-alike paradise at home instead of flying abroad2018–2019
• Fortnite makes a concert its own game mode — 10.7 million attend Marshmello live2019
• Swapfiets sells the city bike as a subscription — one monthly fee covers it all2014–2019
• Whoop stops selling its strap and gives it away with a membership2019
• YUSHIN's FRA robot damps vibration and colour-codes its moving parts2019
• Somnox Sleep Robot: a cuddly robot that breathes slowly so the sleeper's breathing follows2019
• Shopify Tap & Chip Reader: LEDs under a glass-like surface guide card payments2019
• Premortem: assume the project already failed, then list why — before you start2007–2019
• Metalquimia's Signature line deletes handles and crevices where meat bacteria hide2019
• igus ReBeL: a six-axis robot arm made affordable by an all-polymer shell2019
• Gree's Simu humidifier angles its mist at 30 degrees so it never drips condensation2019
• Fresh Intellivent Sky: a bathroom fan that clears odours, humidity and stale air by itself2019
• Coway's AP-1018F shows pollutant content as a gentle ring of light2019
• Baidu's NIRO Pro robot chats without wake words and projects play onto any surface2019
• Panasonic turns birdsong into a hearing test you take on a forest walk2018–2019
• Fully Booked turns novels into radio spots that sound like audiobooks2017–2019
• Berger Paints turns Pakistan's truck art into missing-child posters — 3 found in 4 weeks2019
• Tencent Foundation's Mountain Lights turns donating into a game that lights school roads2018–2019
• Palau's passport stamp becomes an eco-pledge every visitor signs — 150,000 by 20192017–2019
• WeWork: Adam Neumann builds a $47B 'community company' from subleased office space2008–2019
• Office Space: Mike Judge's deadpan 1999 satire becomes office culture's defining comedy1999–2019
• Bootstrapping Calculator: four spreadsheet inputs tell Daniel Vassallo when to quit2019
• Abot makes Slack feedback anonymous both ways — and turns profitable2018–2019
• WifiMask: Dutch brothers make their VPN's no-log promise a legal fact2019
• Stage0: hand-typed hex programs bootstrap a C compiler from a seed binary under 1KB2019
• Python: Guido van Rossum's side-project language, built for readability, eats the world1989–2019
• Mohd Danish sells his bootstrapped public-apis.xyz API directory for $22k2019
• 750 Words: Buster Benson's private journaling side project becomes a $20k/month business2009–2019
• God of War (2018) runs as one unbroken shot — GOTY, 10M sold2013–2019
• Panera Cares: pay-what-you-can cafes serve 2M meals over nine years, then close2010–2019
• Kobayashi City opens a real 'Department of SimCity BuildIt' run by high-school students2018–2019
• Lacoste swaps its crocodile for 10 endangered species — 1,775 polos, one per animal left2018–2019
• Dragon Quest Walk turns the daily commute into a JRPG2016–2019
• MUJI Hotel Ginza: sleep inside the catalog — every room item is for sale (2019)2017–2019
• Operação Serenata de Amor: open-source Rosie AI audits Brazil's congress expenses2016–2019
• Gogglebox: Channel 4 films families watching TV — a BAFTA-winning 'TV about TV' hit2013–2019
• UnionPay makes a 16-minute Tang epic about two soldiers delivering military pay2019
• Nike Beijing's 'Beng Xin Wo Fu Wo' makes bragging the ad — five shorts, 99 jerseys2019
• Helsinki's Oodi: the 'living room' library that drew 3M visits in year one (2018)2013–2019
• Red Hat turns free Linux into a subscription business — paid updates, support, an $84M IPO1999–2019
• The Guardian bets on voluntary membership, not a paywall — 1M reader payments by 20192014–2019
• Carsales AutoAds (2018): a personalised TV ad for every used-car listing2018–2019
• KPlus 'Friendshit': the banking app that gives a shy teen something to say — ADFEST Grande2017–2019
• Blink to Speak: a free eye language that lets paralysed patients talk (2018)2018–2019
• UNIQLO x KAWS 'final collab' sells out in seconds across China — resale doubles prices2019
• Stripe's brag document: a living list of your work that makes reviews honest2019
• Slay the Spire fuses deckbuilding with roguelike runs — a genre is born, 1.5M sold2017–2019
• Samsung #SpaceSelfie puts fans' faces in space via a Galaxy S10 5G at 65,000 ft2019
• Microsoft Japan's 4-day week: 2,300 staff get Fridays off, productivity up 39.9%2019
• Lenganling (冷酸灵) x Xiaolongkan brew hotpot toothpaste — 4,000 sets sold out in half a day2019
• Want Want (旺旺) sells 56 ethnic-style milk cans as blind boxes — 10K+ sets in 24 hours2019
• Myer's smart bauble tells kids if they're naughty or nice — sold out in 11 days2018–2019
• Flipkart's Hagglebot brings bargaining to Google Assistant — first Creative eCommerce GP2018–2019
• Alibaba Pictures' 'What is Peppa?' — a grandpa hunts the pig, 1.6B Weibo reads2019
• 'The Truth Is Worth It': NYT films its own reporting — double Cannes Grand Prix 20192018–2019
• Huawei's 'Wukong': a bare-phone vertical film goes viral for Children's Day2019
• Beat the Street turns a town into a game — 2M+ players across 200 communities2013–2019
• NetEase Yanxuan counters Double 11 with apologies, 20% off2019
• Mnet's Produce 101 makes viewers 'national producers' — the audience builds the idol group2016–2019
• Hyundai's Vantablack Pavilion at Pyeongchang wins ADFEST 2019 Design Grande2018–2019
• DAIKI Angel Help's dementia-waitstaff restaurant wins ACC 2019 Grand Prix2017–2019
• Zhihu's "Don't Know Clinic" turns Q&A into a pop-up hospital — Sanlitun queues, then tours2017–2019
• Scent Library's 2017 Liang Bai Kai perfume turned boiled-water scent into a hit2017–2019
• Nissin turns chick mascot Hiyoko-chan into a demon to launch spicy ramen — ADFEST Grande2018–2019
• Netflix censors its own Narcos Mexico trailer to tease it — ADFEST 2019 Outdoor Grande2018–2019
• IKEA's ThisAbles turns furniture into accessible design via free 3D-printable add-ons2018–2019
• Glade stuffs Walmart shipping pillows with scent — 'Scent by Glade' wins Effie Gold 20202019
• Commerzbank turns sexist clichés into a ponytail anthem — Grand Effie Germany 20202019
• Oreo builds the Forbidden City from 10,600 cookies — 760K boxes sold day one2019
• JCDecaux (1964): free bus shelters paid for by ads create the street-furniture model1964–2019
• Taobao takes its maker shops offline as a ticketed festival — 30,000 visitors in 3 days2016–2019
• Dentsu's Stradivarius Timeless Journey lets you hear 300 years of one violin's sound2018–2019
• Starbucks China's cat paw cup: a 199-yuan tumbler becomes a national frenzy2019
• Plogging: Stockholm's jog-and-pick-up-litter movement that circled the globe2016–2019
• Perfect Diary turns Chinese landscapes into a 16-shade National Geographic palette2019
• Oreo rebuilds the Forbidden City from 10,600 cookies — 3M views in 3 days2019
• Cadillac's meme ad 'No Rear-Wheel Drive, No Luxury' — 240M plays in China2019
• Black & Abroad turns the slur 'Go Back to Africa' into a travel invitation — Cannes GP2019
• Zhihu 2019 Brand Film Turns “有问题” into Praise, Winning 4A Best Script2019
• Sony lets employees pitch new businesses — First Flight crowdfunds them2014–2019
• Squatty Potty: a family-made toilet stool hits $164M sales after a pooping-unicorn ad2011–2019
• Tencent QQ's 20-years-of-data 'personal trajectory' H5 — viral within hours2019
• Mayinglong, China's hemorrhoid-cream maker, launches lipstick — the absurdity sells it2019
• Keep's 2019 'Fear Is Right' film reframes fear as motivation — 28.6M Weibo topic reads2019
• Rent the Runway turned designer dresses into 4-day rentals for $150.2009–2019
• Casper compressed mattresses into boxes, one model, 100-night trial2014–2019
• Giang Café's 1946 egg coffee becomes Hanoi's signature drink1946–2019
• Coupang makes delivery speed the product - Rocket Delivery reshapes Korean e-commerce2014-2019
• Copenhagen puts a ski slope on a waste incinerator — CopenHill opens in 20192019
• NYPL rebuilds five classics as Instagram Stories — 300k reads, followers up 67%2018–2019
• Celeste's Assist Mode: a hard platformer where difficulty is a dial, not a gate2018–2019
• Nomad List: a shared spreadsheet becomes a $15–25K/month city-ranking business2014–2019
• Disco Elysium turns a detective's thoughts into game mechanics — wins GDC Best Narrative2019
• Death Stranding makes deliveries a shared world — strangers leave ladders for each other2019
• Basecamp's Shape Up ships work in six-week cycles — appetites, not estimates2009–2019
• Baba Is You puts the game's own rules on screen — then lets players rewrite them2017–2019
• Ant Forest turns low-carbon habits into a game — 500M users plant 100M real trees2016–2019
• Getty and fiftyfifty recast homeless vendors as stock models to fund housing2018