Normalization of SWR Discussions

Research on Safe Withdrawal Rates

Moderator: hocus2004

hocus2004
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Normalization of SWR Discussions

Post by hocus2004 »

I have been hinting in various ways for a long time that I believed that where the various FIRE/Passion Saving/Retire Early communities were eventually headed was to normalization of SWR discussions. I have a tendency to allow my enthusiasm for learning about the subject matter of these boards to spill over the top from time to time, and I think that I have been guilty on occasion of thinking that we all could work through the change that we need to work through a good bit sooner than it is generally possible for human beings to work through changes of the magnitude that we are struggling with here.

The Great SWR Debate is a wonderful debate. It always has been and it always will be. We have learned a lot. People who read the material on these boards (this one in particular) know more about how to invest effectively for the long term than 90 percent of the people who get paid big bucks to expound on their "expertise" in this field. We don't just look to magazine articles or even serious research papers to determine how to invest our money in accord with our hopes of achieving financial independence early in life. We look at all that stuff, and then we go about the business of checking it out to see whether it really makes sense, and, if it does, whether the insights offered can be extended, enhanced, improved.

What we have done during the first 25 months of the Great SWR Debate is to extend the insights that were offered in the conventional methodology SWR studies. William Bernstein described the Trinity study (the most famous of the conventional methodology studies) as a "breakthrough" piece of research. He was right to say that. The insights provided by the conventional studies really were breakthrough insights. They put all of us on a path to realizing our FIRE/Passion Saving/Retire Early dreams years sooner than would otherwise have been possible.

But the fun didn't stop there. What we have done through a process of learning together over the course of the past 25 months is to take those wonderful conventional methodology insights and extend them, sharpen them, enhance them. We will always be making use of the conventional studies--they serve an important purpose in our investment assessment efforts and always will. But we are not satisifed with the insights those studies offer. We are positively greedy for ever more knowledge of how to achieve financial independence as early in life as possible. We want to achieve our goals years sooner than the time in which it would be possible to achieve them if we fell into the trap of thinking that the conventional methodology studies offered the last word in SWR analysis.

We have a built a better tool, the SWR tool of the future. Will this tool be written up in books and peer-reviewed articles and general-interest magazine articles and all the rest, like the earlier one has been? It will be. Not just yet. We have made a few tentative moves in that direction, but the time is not quite ripe for a full-fledged publicity campaign. We want to get all of our own ducks in a row before we take this breakthrough tool public. With some recent developments we are getting close to the time when it will be right to take it public in a big way, but we remain a step or two short of that point at this moment in time.

But the tool will be taken public and it will stand the "Stocks for the Long Run" paradigm that has dominated investment analysis for two decades now on its head. Is that statement another case of "hocus being hocus'? It is. I'm proud of it too. hocus loves the idea of middle-class workers being able to achieve financial independence early in life and becoming free to do all sorts of things with their lives more exciting than doing the work needed to put food on the table. I positively gush about the potential of this wonderful investing tool because I have worked with the tool for eight years now and I know it to be the most powerful investing tool that I have ever seen in my life. It's a wonderful tool, and as more people begin making use of it, we are all going to come to realize that. That will be a sweet day for the entire FIRE/Passion Saving/Retire Early community.

Is it egotistical for me to say that a tool that I developed is so wonderful? If you are bound and determined to look at things from the most negative perspective possible, you might say that. The tool is wonderful and I want every single community member from every single board community to know about it and to make use of it. How would you expect me to make that happen, by pretending that my post of May 13, 2002, was a "mistake," as it has been referred to on one or two occasions?

No. That post was the most important post ever put to a FIRE board. It was not important because it had my name on it. It was important because of the insights it sent forth into the various communities. The communities grabbed hold of the insight and made it shine. One poster added this, another added the other thing, a third added yet a third enhancement, and look at what we ended up with--the mind-blowing SWR tool you see described in the posts added to this particular discussion board on an almost daily basis.

We changed the world with our creatiion of this tool. I did that. You did it too. We did it together. That's the idea, of course. That's why this new discussion board communications medium is such an exciting communications medium of the future. It allows people like us to pool our talents and thereby do together things that we could never dream of doing with each of us trying to move forward only on the small power of our personal self-generated intellectual steam.

We changed the world. Can we let that in? Can we begin to feel as good about what we have done here as it is proper for us to feel? Can we start giving ourselves some credit for what we have accomplished?

The signs that I read when visiting the various boards tells me that we can. I see a change in the tone of the SWR discussions at every single board. Some are moving faster than others. All are taking at least small steps in the direction of the place where we all want to end up, the place where all community members know that these boards were created for the purpose of allowing people to offer honest and informed insights on how to achieve financial independence early in life, and that that is the purpose that they all once again really do serve.

This place is never going to be the same again. Not after the announcement that ES made last night. We all get a fresh start. That is what ES is saying, if you read between the lines of the post. Starting today, it's as if the Post Archives didn't exist. Any poster can come to this board, put forward any reasonable comment re SWRS that he or she likes, and he or she will be given a warm welcome and a reasonsed response in return. There aren't many places in the world today where you can get that sort of deal without having to pay as much as a dime, are there? That's the deal you get here. Treasure it. Send ES an e-mail thanking him for what he has done. He deserves it.

How about the other boards? You see change coming about at those places too. I have been spending much of my posting time at the Early Retirement Forum of late, so I would like to bring to your attention two absolutely mind-blowing threads that have been developed in recent days over there.

This one is called "SWR of 6.21 Percent for 26 Years." It's the second most read thread in the history of the forum, with 234 posts and close to 6,000 reads. Insights by the bucketful put forward by scores of people with a thirst for learning all that it is possible to learn about how to achieve financial independence early in life.

The charge for gaining access to these mind-blowing insights? Zero. If you count the time it takes you to move your cursor over to the link and give it a little push, darn close to zero. That's what I call a Value Proposition Supreme. It's just words. But what thrilling and life-enhancing words!

Check it out.

http://early-retirement.org/cgi-bin/yab ... 1080235218

It's Dory36 you should thank for that one. And for the next one too.

The more recent Early Retirement Forum mind-blower is a little thing called "True Love." No, it's really a little thing called "Yahoo Finance Quiz," but my pretend title offers you a better idea of the value of what you are going to find on the other side of the link you see below.

Do you want to miss out on something as good as True Love? I didn't think so. Give the baby a little click, my good friend. It's 243 posts and close to 6,300 reads of "sometimes you feel like a data-based SWR and sometimes you don't" indescribable deliciousness.

Are you a Cat in the Hat sort of fellow? The Cat says this thread is "positivelootingly wackicanacious." I think the Cat is on to something. It's worth a ride in the way that going 60 in a red convertible with the top down on the first day of real Spring weather is worth a ride. Listen to what the people are saying about the realities of SWRs. Now! Do it! God gave you a clicker so that you could click on things like this. Click into the ever fresh wonders of the community's rapidly expanding SWR conciousness.

http://early-retirement.org/cgi-bin/yab ... 1085366592

The Debate About Having a Debate is over. That's not precisely so. There are a few holdouts who just can't get enough of the word game posts and the intimidation posts and the blah blah nonsense gibberish threads. There are still remnants of the old days here and there. Just ignore that stuff, OK? Don't even bother to refute it. It's too stupid to refute. Like Scuffy the Tugboat, we were made for better things. Let's all sail down unexplored rivers of adventure. Leave the word games for the political threads. They don't do much real harm there. The stuff we want to talk about matters too much not to want to get it right.

There are lots of little reasons why I say that the Debate About Having a Debate has for practical purposes come to an end. Visit the boards, enjoy the thrill of discovering them for yourself. There are two big reasons that I think I had better make note of just to make sure that no one misses out on the good news.

First, there's the ES post from last night. You know about that. I doubt that there is anyone who doesn't know in his or her heart of hearts that that is a sign of better days to come for this site.

The other big positive sign is the Dory36 post that comes at the end (for the time being) of the "Yahoo Finance Quiz" thread linked above. Here are some healing words from Dory36.

Dory36: "Jeez Louise, folks! I go away for just a short while and you all get crazy on me!

Personally, I think that when a thread becomes a meta discussion, discussing more about the participants and discussion itself than the topic of the thread, it's time to just drop the subject.

It is also pretty unfair to those NOT in the discussion to make them wade through many pages of stuff to find material related to the topic title. "

You get the idea. Debating about Debating is out, Learning Together is in. Don't be retro! Get with the fashions of the day or someone is for sure going to say that you look like your mommy dressed you this morning. None of us want that.

It really have been a great debate for a little more than two years now. You and me are going to make it an even greater one in the next two years to come.

What is it the Numbers Guy is always advising us--Have fun? Imagine being a Numbers Guy and still knowing enough about what matters in Real Life to have come up with that one.

Quotations from Beatles songs have been a sub-theme that has appeared regularly throughout the pages of The Great SWR Debate. I'll take my sign-off from the words of a darn good song from my favorite mop-top, the cute one, the good-natured melodic one. I don't know how he did it but somehow or other he knew in advance what was going to go down in the SWR discussions and what JWR1945 was going to suggest as the best medicine, and what to say to tell people that JWR1945 was the one who has his head on straight re this thing, and so on.

Here's McCartney:

"Oh, won't you listen to what the man said?"

Here's the JWR1945 sign off that McCartney was wise enough to make reference to before it even existed:

"Have Fun!"

Here's a one-word commentary by hocus (my first one-word post ever, it might be argued):

"Normalize!"
JWR1945
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Post by JWR1945 »

Here is my earlier post taken from the Town Center:

Have fun from Wed, Jan 22, 2003 at 2:34 pm CST
http://www.nofeeboards.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=377

Have fun.

John R.

BTW, my daughter has corrected me. It was her Junior Prom.
peteyperson
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Post by peteyperson »

Did you not get a rap on the knuckles from the missus because she got left giving the tough speech while you got to play the fun dad? :lol:

Petey
JWR1945 wrote:Here is my earlier post taken from the Town Center:

Have fun from Wed, Jan 22, 2003 at 2:34 pm CST
http://www.nofeeboards.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=377

Have fun.

John R.

BTW, my daughter has corrected me. It was her Junior Prom.
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Post by hocus2004 »

These two recent posts by AdvocatusDiaboli are two small steps in the direction of normalization.

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid=21065840

Advo: "At the peak in 2000, the market was valued at over 30 times peak earnings. Historically, the average has been at 14. The long-term real increase in S%P 500 earnings has been about 1.5%. Let's be generous and assume 2% increase in real earnings going forward. Assuming that the market would return to the average of 14 times peak earnings in the course of the next 30 years the real capital gains(after inflation) would be (14/30)^(1/30) x (1.06) - 1 = -0.558% a year. Adding 1 percent of dividend yield the real returns from the height of the bubble going forward could be expected at about 0.44% a year.

Correct me if I am wrong with my calculations, but I think it is safe to say that the SWR from 2000's valuations is not 4%."

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid=21079331

Advo: "Safe withdrawal rate. From these valuation levels if you want to be reasonably certain that you don't wipe out your retirement account it's probably something like 2.5% or so. "
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Post by hocus2004 »

In this thread from the Motley Fool board

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... e#21281528

it is revealed that Wanderer has added his photo to a collection of photos of Motley Fool board regulars set forth at a site maintained by 1HappyFool.

This is a strong sign of impending Normalization. Those who have been with us from the beginning may remember that it was the intercst-led Smear Campaign against Wanderer that was the proximate cause of my posting of the fateful May 13, 2002, post asking whether changes in price levels might have an effect on SWRs.

I had developed the Data-Based SWR Tool back in 1996, but kept quiet about it at the Motley Fool board because I was concerned that bringing up the subject would cause dissension and do damage to the community. But when stock prices went down, intercst initiated a policy of attacking any poster who questioned any of his dogmas, and I went on a "hiatus" from posting. Wanderer became the most popular and most effective poster in the non-intercst wing of the board community. When so few community members spoke up against the Smear Campaign against Wanderer, I realized that the policy of going along to get along had been proven a failure and decided that the only hope of saving what was left of the board that I and scores of other Information Seekers had built was to generate some on-topic debate fast. I determined that things had reached a point where the potential downside of telling the truth re SWRs was no longer so great (given the damage that had already been done through the various Smear Campaigns) and that the upside was substantial (there had been a number of posts expressing a thirst for on-topic debate, and these had been awarded large numbers of recommendations by the board community).

I have long thought that the best way to declare an official end to the Great SWR Debate would be to have Wanderer's name appear on a post at the Motley Fool board again. That would send a clear signal to the Disruptors that their intimidation tactics had not worked at that particular board. We do not yet have a post at the Motley Fool board with Wanderer's name on it. But we have his picture included in a group of pictures of that community's board regulars. I think it is fair to say that things are looking up a bit.

intercst: " I couldn't be prouder that wanderer and 1HappyFool think I'm an a$$hole. "

iHappyFool: "Well, it's not like there's a shortage of solid evidence on which to base a conclusion. <grin>"
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Post by JWR1945 »

..that was the proximate cause of my posting of the fateful May 13, 2002, post asking whether changes in price levels might have an effect on SWRs.
IIRC, what you asked for were Price-Adjusted Safe Withdrawal Rates (i.e., the numbers), not whether price levels would have an effect.

IIRC, you asked this because you wanted to invest money in the stock market, but you needed this kind of information to back up your actions. IIRC, some of your 7% MNBA certificates of deposit were maturing.

IIRC, it came out later that you recognized the importance of having a growth component in a retirement portfolio. It is necessary to extend the lifespan of the portfolio.

Have fun.

John R.
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Post by hocus2004 »

"Wanderer has added his photo to a collection of photos of Motley Fool board regulars set forth at a site maintained by 1HappyFool. This is a strong sign of impending Normalization.'

This morning we learn that, at the request of Ariechert, 1HappyFool has added a photo of hocus to the mix.

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... sort=whole

Normalization gains traction!
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Post by hocus2004 »

Here's a poll that I put up at the Motley Fool board to gain input on a question of far greater import than that little matter of whether the Bush presidency should continue another four years or be brought to a quick end--Should TMF ban hocus2004?

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid=21299039

I am proud to say that 49 perent of the REHP board community (40 votes) expressed a belief that "No, I do not favor TMF banning hocus2004."￾

I am equally proud to observe that the other 51 percent of the community (42 votes) expressed a belief that it is not possible for intercst to maintain confidence in his SWR claims if hocus2004 is permitted to post at that board.

That's sort of a joke. But the serious point at the core is that it might not be a bad idea for those seeking Normalization to begin laughing more and worrying less about the efforts of Intercst and the other DCMs to further intimidate fellow community members. We may have reached the point where an experience that once had its tragic aspects is being repeated as farce.

The Information Seekers won the battle of ideas. The Disruptors won the battle for board control. Had our case been as strong on May 13, 2002, as it is today, there never would have been any battle--we would have taken over the field without needing to fight to do so. But we didn't have the case then that we have today. We have built this case stronger and stronger over the past 28 months. The battle that it took to build it rock solid caused a lot of Information Seekers to leave the community. That's too bad. Still, like it or not, that's the reality we face.

The Disruptors ain't gonna let us back in to present our now rock-solid case because we ask nicely. To move things forward, we need to win over a good number of new Information Seekers to our cause. Our power is the power of community. As our community grows, so will our freedom to have the sorts of discussions we want to have at the sorts of places we want to have them. Rebuilding the community is our challenge for the year 2005. I'll be presenting some ideas as to how we might pull that off in future days.

We once before built an ordinary sort of board into a board that was often cited as the most thought-provoking on the face of Planet Internet. We can do it again. We'll do it this time the same way we did it the last time. We will offer middle-class workers a value proposition so compelling it cannot be denied--honest and informed insights on how to achieve financial freedom early in life. If the response we received to the Passion Saving concept when we presented a sneak preview in the Winter, Spring, and Summer of 2000 is a fair indication of the outside world's level of interest in these ideas, I believe that our presentation of the complete version of the story will at a minimum win for us the few dozen souls we need to plant our flag once again in the soil of the Retire Early Home Page discussion board (we'll give it a new name to better reflect its new agenda). Either way, our efforts to do so should prove to be an adventure not to be missed.

It's a mighty big Wave that's on its way to these shores. Good thing it's on our side!
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Post by ben »

Hi Hocus,
I was one of those voting against banning - main reason; I am generally against banning. Second reason; you are persistent enough to be there anyway under other names :D so I think that the community will be better of knowing who the actual poster is (Hocus) and what he stands for rather than 500 other names. (BTW, Did it not cost you a fortune in membership fees to do that stunt?).
If people don't agree/don't want to read; fool.com have ignore bottons Etc. and they naturally only work when they know who they want to ignore.
Cheers!
Normal; to put on clothes bought for work, go to work in car bought to get to work needed to pay for the clothes, the car and the home left empty all day in order to afford to live in it...
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Post by hocus2004 »

"Did it not cost you a fortune in membership fees to do that stunt?"

The suggestion here is that you consider my signing up under a new account when the account I prefer to use ("hocus") was terminated was a "stunt." Why do you consider it a stunt? Do you have any suggestions for alternate ways for me to communicate with a board community after I have been banned from posting under the user name I prefer to use when posting to discussion boards?
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Post by ben »

Don't get me wrong - forget the word "stunt" then! :D
But I guess you could not just change log-in name and had to buy new membership(s) right? I certainly admire your efforts and your energy in this connection. Cheers!
Normal; to put on clothes bought for work, go to work in car bought to get to work needed to pay for the clothes, the car and the home left empty all day in order to afford to live in it...
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Post by hocus2004 »

"Don't get me wrong - forget the word "stunt" then! "

OK, Ben. I did not like the word "stunt." It's not at all like me to engage in stunts, certainly not in connection with the work I do helping middle-class workers learn what it takes to achieve financial freedom early in life.

"But I guess you could not just change log-in name and had to buy new membership(s) right?"

It does not cost you anything just to change a user name. When I changed from "AbrahamLinkin" to "hocus2004," there was no expense incurred.

However, there is a cost incurred when an account is terminated and a new one needs to be established. When the "hocus" account was terminated, and I established the "SamCooke1961" account, I needed to pay a new admission fee.

My time has value, and I have devoted an extraordinary amount of time to the SWR discussions. So I view the cash that I had to pay out to participate in the discussions as an insignificant portion of the total cost that I have incurred.

"I certainly admire your efforts and your energy in this connection."

Thanks for saying that, Ben. I appreciate it.

I don't say that I do this as an act of altruism. I probably gained more from the learning experiences made possible at the hocus-era REHP board than any other community member. So I have a selfish interest in rebuilding the Motley Fool board community. But it is not just me who will benefit from these efforts. There were over 100 community members who expressed a desire that intercst permit honest and informed posting on SWRs. I believe that those people have rights to use the board for the purposes for which they built it, and I believe that they will welcome the changes that will come with the leadership transition. I also believe that there are hundreds or possibly even thousands who have not yet heard of the board who could benefit from it if it were run according to the published Motley Fool site rules and became known as a place where aspiring early retirees could trade ideas on how to pursue their dream. I hope to be engaged in both teaching and learning experiences with those hundreds or thousands of fellow community members in days to come.

The discussion-board communications medium is an important communications medium of the future. The medium is now in its developmental stages. We all know that discussion boards generally do not get a lot of respect, and the reasons why they do not have been brought home to us many times in the course of the Great SWR Debate. Motley Fool took an important step toward making boards safe for responsible posters with its publication of its "Learning Together" statement of site rules, and I believe that Motley Fool will find in time that it needs to return to reasonable enforcement of those rules to make the business of site administration a profitable one for the long term. I have hopes that the work we are doing here will play a role in establishing reasonable rules by which discussion boards will be administered in the future, and I bellieve that that is work that very much needs to be done.

Discussion boards are both the best of communictions mediums and the worst of communications mediums at the same time. If I may be so bold as to say so, I believe that the hocus-era REHP board represents the best of what this new communications medium can be. It is also my view that the intercst-ere REHP board represents the worst of what the new communications medium can be.

I do not say that the people who want to use the REHP board for purely social interaction and not to discuss early retirement do not have a right to set up a board at which they can properly do so. I strongly oppose, however, their hijacking of a board that hundreds of people puts thousands of hours of work into building for use serving very different purposes. There is a place for discussions of politics and sitcoms and bird feeders. That place is not the REHP board, at least not so long as those using the board to discuss politics, sitcoms, and bird feeders remain intolerant of those who want to use the board for the purposes for which it was established--the exchange of honest and informed posting on the subject of how to achieve financial independence early in life. I am OK with the idea of the two groups co-existing in the same board community. I am not OK with the idea of the social-oriented group taking over the board and driving out those who devoted lots of time and energy into building a community that was once the most important board at the Motley Fool site (and arguably the most important on the face of the internet).
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Post by hocus2004 »

This thread at the Motley Fool board shows that community not to be moving in the direction of Normalization, but to be taking a big step backwards. I willed myself to express some optimisim in my posts to the thread (in an attempt to encourage community members interested in on-topic debate) but the reality is not good.

It is shocking to me that nearly 60 percent of the board expressed a lack of desire for more on-topic discussion. It is also shocking that a good number of DCMs expressed an intent to disrupt not only any SWR-related discussions that I start, but any on-topic discussions that I start on any topic whatsoever. That ain't normal.

I believe that the idea that I put forward is a sound one. If there were one day each week when those interested in on-topic posting knew that there would be something for them, those posters would come to look forward to that day and to participate regularly. Over time, we could attract people from the larger Motley Fool community with an interest in early retirement issues to that board. It is my strong sense, however, that now is not the time to move forward with this initiative.

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... sort=whole

hocus2004: "Would you like to see more on-topic discussion at this board?" There were 22 yes votes to this poll, and 31 no votes.

Tmeri: "I voted "No." If too many people vote "Yes," then we will have to hear from hocus for years to come about this particular poll. If more people vote "No," then he won't be bringing it up in the future."

hocus2004: "Here's what I am thinking.

"If there are more than two or three people who are interested in seeing some on-topic threads, I could make it a practice each Wednesday morning to repost an old post of mine that either got a good reaction or that generated good discussion. That way, the group that wants on-topic stuff would know that on Wednesdays they would be sure to have something to look at and talk about.

"My presumption is that we might get only a small response in the early going, but that, as word got out that there was on-topic stuff appearing here on a regular basis, more and more people from the outside Motley Fool community would join in. At some point, we would have enough people contributing on-topic stuff to generate a good number of entirely fresh on-topic discussions.

"None of this would interfere with the off-topic stuff in any way. The idea would be to add something to the board experience, not to subtract anything from it."

inparadise: "You kid yourself. He'll still bring up the poll, but it will be under the guise of how the great conspiracy to control board discussion even influenced the result of his poll."

Telegraph: "NO need to rehash old stuff unless there is significant new relevant studies that would be useful. "

hocus2004: "I'm not talking about SWR stuff, Telegraph. I'm talking about non-SWR stuff."

Pauleckler: "On topic success requires a constant stream of newbies who ask the basic questions and keep us answering those questions. That feature went away when TMF started charging for access. That leaves us a highly inbred group. "

CatherineCoy: "Why don't you post something NEW? But not SWR. And short. "

Ariechert: "Have at it. Be my guest. There's nothing to stop you. Heck, you might even get some replies. Worth a try."

hocus2004: "I'm not too interested in Q&As, paulecklers. I'm interested in seeing more discussions of the Retire Early experience.

"The topic of this board is the most wonderful topic in the world, in my view. When you talk about how to achieve financial independence early in life, what you are really talking about is how to become more free to live the life you really want to live. It wouldn't be too far off the mark to say that the topic of this board is life itself. The only significant distinction is that we zero in on the financial aspects of the question.

"I don't believe that we will ever run out of mind-bending things to talk about. Not in 6 Wednesdays, not in 60 Wednedays, not in 600 Wednesdays, and not in 6,000 Wednesdays."

decath: "Hocus dude!

"You are a glutton for punishment! I think this is the 1st time I've ever responded to a hocus thread or any thread related to the "great debate". I don't have anything personal against you but just offer a bit of warning that many of the posters here are pretty ruthless as I'm sure you already know.

"Are you sure you want to deal with the hocus bashing day in and day out???"

Tashina: "Just to clarify, I voted yes before I read the whole thread. I am in favor of more on-topic posts (although I don't mind the off-topic ones), but I do NOT want that to be construed to mean that I want more Hocus posts. "

chooey98: "I think it has been long established that the regular participants on this board are happy with it the way it is."

intercst: "If memory serves, you've started several boards devoted to "on-topic" discussions of SWR and other various and sundry 'retire early' minutia. None have attracted more than a handful of posters.

"Can you now see that this is not a recipe for success? Or does your illness prevent you from processing the results of this poll, too?"
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Post by JWR1945 »

hocus2004 wrote:Discussion boards are both the best of communications mediums and the worst of communications mediums at the same time. If I may be so bold as to say so, I believe that the hocus-era REHP board represents the best of what this new communications medium can be. It is also my view that the intercst-era REHP board represents the worst of what the new communications medium can be.
This is very sad. They may turn around, but not anytime soon.

One would expect the Motley Fool to step in to increase the value of their franchise (which includes discussion boards) simply because they are a business. Instead, they continue to follow the path of the WISE.

I find it troubling that many fail to grow after retirement. Instead, they wither and become bitter.

Retirement should be an opportunity, not a dead-end. [Pun intended, but only in part.]

Have fun.

John R.
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Post by hocus2004 »

Here's a link to a thread at the Motley Fool's REHP board titled "Who Are These People?"

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... e#21575443

That one inspired the following thread at the Motley Fool's Political Asylum board.

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... sort=whole

iHappyFool: "They are people who don't have the smarts to realize how rude it is to assume that a political post that makes it to the "Best Of" list is not a true reflection of the character of the board. Unfortunately, there are so many of them that it is changing the character of the board. "

RhodieTed: "Would you prefer the posts to be about flax seed and Hocus 24/7?"

Arette: "See - that's one of those silly flops of logic. As if those were the only options. Why, any aspect of 2828's life can be fascinating, people talking about trips, houses, NDEs, wacky in-laws, golf, cajun cooking, etc. And those are just the off-topic posts. We even occasionally have on-topic post. I kid you not!"

LuckyDog2002: "We could inundate the PA board with posts concerning Retiring Early and our day to day lives. "

EdnmKn: "GREAT IDEA!! I'll start:

Thurst: "Yep...If folks will "relieve themselves" over at the PA board, there will be a lot fewer flies buzzing around this place!
"
Fleg9bo: "As far as on-topic goes, I posted this on 2/11/00.
"The wide variety of topics is what keeps me coming back to this thread. If it was all strictly about how much can you safely withdraw and 72(t), I would be long gone." (post #3692)"

Arrete: "Well, reasoned political discourse is fine. It's the people who come out of nowhere, fire a few rounds and then disappear. They have no interest in the board in terms of retirement topics. They're just getting their jollies scoring a few hits. They're likely flying trolls. I'm not talking about the regular denizens of this zoo. <g>"

Ziggy29: "Politics are certainly sometimes relevant to the discussion of retiring early...but I don't think it needs 98% of the discussion. IMO, of course, and while I don't think politics should be off-limits, I do wish it were less prominent and discussed more within the context of the quest to retire early."

inparadise: "Politics is on this board in the current ratio of political to nonP precisely because someone is interested enough in posting a political thread or replying to one. If you wish to change the ratio, the solution is easy. Post on some other topic and make it interesting enough for others to reply."

Fleg9bo: "Stop being so divisive."

EdnmKn (at the PA Board): "Not sure if this is the right board, but I have some questions on SWR's (Safe Withdrawal Rates). What do you guys think, 4% or higher, lower? "

lifeforcedanceri: "The main thing is, never spend the principal.
Spend the interest only. "

LuckyDog2002: "As far as the withdrawal rate, well this is a controversial subject in some circles with those folks who like to debate, but in my opinion, it's anyones guess. I would suggest not spending more than you take in in income."

ReddyTeddy: "I don't know if Bush is the greatest President ever, but the guy who started this thread gets my vote for "Wierdest Troll Ever". "
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Post by ben »

Hocus; the retire early home page board is a privately established board, and even though it rests on the fool.com server it is still up to the users to overall decide what direction the board should go.

To keep the subject on FIRE is apparently hard (I guess one run out of subjects - and posters that want on-topic discussion can try to start subjects of interest).

I remember you wanted to post some older subjects/posts for new discussion weekly on the REHP - I have not seen any? Did you decide against it?
Normal; to put on clothes bought for work, go to work in car bought to get to work needed to pay for the clothes, the car and the home left empty all day in order to afford to live in it...
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Post by JWR1945 »

ben wrote:Hocus; the retire early home page board is a privately established board, and even though it rests on the fool.com server it is still up to the users to overall decide what direction the board should go.

To keep the subject on FIRE is apparently hard (I guess one run out of subjects - and posters that want on-topic discussion can try to start subjects of interest).

I remember you wanted to post some older subjects/posts for new discussion weekly on the REHP - I have not seen any? Did you decide against it?
The Retire Early Home Page discussion board at the Motley Fool is different from the Retire Early Home Page website.

The Motley Fool controls what is posted at fool.com. The Motley Fool is responsible for what is posted at their own site. They are responsible for establishing and enforcing their own posting rules.

Several of us have tried submitting on-topic posts at the Motley Fool. We have been driven away. My own efforts were blocked sufficiently often for me to abandon the site altogether.

In addition, people are charged a fee to use the Motley Fool discussion boards. It is a commercial venture. The Motley Fool has not lived up to its part of the bargain.

I know that hocus has mentioned posting weekly at dory36's Early Retirement Forum discussion board. I am unaware of such actions at the Motley Fool's website.

Have fun.

John R.
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ben
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Post by ben »

I have not seen any weekly posts on Dorys board either?
Normal; to put on clothes bought for work, go to work in car bought to get to work needed to pay for the clothes, the car and the home left empty all day in order to afford to live in it...
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Post by JWR1945 »

Look under the Young Dreamers section.

There is an especially good post about the High Cost of Flattery (among others).

Have fun.

John R.
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Post by hocus2004 »

It is still up to the users to overall decide what direction the board should go.

That's how it should be, Ben. The users of the REHP board are the people who put their times and energies into making it what it at one time was--a board that was often referred to as one of the most thought-provoking on the face of the internet. The users of the board spoke loud and clear on the SWR issue. Scores of posts were put up there in which large segments of the board community asked that intercst and the other DCMs knock off the funny business. If you like, I can put up links here to posts with messages along those lines that got 40 recs or 50 rec or 60 recs or 70s recs.

Most reasonable people love what that board stood for during its Golden Age and most reasonable people hate what that board stands for today. Those people should be permitted to use the board for the purpose for which it was created--to faciliate honest and informed discussions of how to retire early. All who want to see this happen should demand that Motley Fool take action to rein in intercst and the other DCMs. A portion of the $30 entrance fee paid by those who participate there goes to paying the salaries of the board administrators. They are not doing the jobs they are paid to do. We should insist that they protect us from DCM-type posters, as they promise to in the published posting rules.

You and I and all other Information Seekers have a legitimate right to a say in what sort of posts are permitted at that board, Ben. We should all make sure that we exercise that right responsibly so that the community which makes use of the board to learn how to retire early has access to accurate information on the subject matter of the board.

"To keep the subject on FIRE is apparently hard (I guess one run out of subjects)"

Early Retirement is a relatively new topic, one with hundreds and hundreds of unexplored questions. There are new topics raised at the Early Retirement Forum on an almost daily basis. There were new topics raised at this site's FIRE board on an almost daily basis in the days before the DCMs imported the tactics that had been used at an earlier time to burn the REHP board to the ground to burn the FIRE board to the ground as well. We need not worry about there being a shortage of things to talk about at an early retirement board for many years and decades to come.

To generate on-topic discussions, you need posters with an interest in the topic of the board, of course. It is the posters with an interest in the subject of early retirement who put up the scores and scores of posts thanking me for reporting accurately what the historical data says in the early days of the Great SWR Debate. It is these posters who left the board in disgust as the DCMS became ever more abusive in their posting practices.

If there is anyone who in unclear at this point as to the harm done to a discussion board community by tolerance of DCM-posting practives, please take a look at the REHP Post Archives from its Golden Age (December 1999 through January 2001) and compare those discussions to the discussions held at that board today. I challenge anyone to put forward an argument that the problem of DCM posting is not an extremely serious one after doing that.

"Posters that want on-topic discussion can try to start subjects of interest."

They can try, Ben. The DCMs are a determined group, however. And if it often easier to succeed at destroying something than it is to succeed at building it in the first place or building it back up after it has been destoyed. The DCMs consider it a day of hard work well done when they can walk away from a board community in ruins. Information Seekers have a very different and very much harder and very much more rewarding agenda. We build communities, we don't destroy them. That's why DMCs make it a practice to follow us from board community to board community to board community. Where you see Information Seekers, you see useful and enlightening board discussions. And where a DCM sees useful and enlightening board discussions, a DCM sees a long day's work ahead of him..

"I remember you wanted to post some older subjects/posts for new discussion weekly on the REHP - I have not seen any? Did you decide against it?"

I've decided against it for the time-being, Ben. I put up a poll asking the community there whether it wanted on-topic debate. The vote was 51-49 AGAINST on-topic debate. I feel for the 49 percent, and I would like to be able to help them out. But when a board community cannot muster a majority in favor of on-topic debate, it is not just a clown board; it is a sick clown board. Overcoming the sustained efforts of a sick clown culture is a task that's bigger than what even this mightily determined Information Seeker is able to take on.

I believe that the REHP board will see better days. When things begin moving in the right direction, I will be there to help do what I can to guide things in the direction in which aspiring early retirees want to see them go. But I need to see something from within the board community before I can devote more of my life energy to rebuilding that board. If one of the community members who makes up the 49 percent whose rights to participate in honest and informed on-topic debate are now being abused wants to see change, he or she is going to need to work up the courage to get the fire started himself or herself. I watch the board, and when the time is right, I will drop in my two cents.
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