From "That Other Board"

Financial Independence/Retire Early -- Learn How!
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hocus
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From "That Other Board"

Post by hocus »

Here's a link to my latest thread-starter from over at "that other board."

http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid= ... sort=whole
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ataloss
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Post by ataloss »

It looks like some will try to pick a fight over anything (I am thinking of the long post complaining about your long post :)
Have fun.

Ataloss
JWR1945
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Post by JWR1945 »

For those at the Motley Fool who asked who hocus means by WE, I just identified myself as part of that group.

I have seen it again and again. But it is still hard to believe it. Telegraph insisted on being obnoxious. Why? I do not know. I doubt that it is worthwhile for me to know.

Have fun.

John R.
raddr
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Post by raddr »

I just visited over there. It looks like the REHP may implode when the new fee kicks in. The emperor himself is apparently leaving as is another of the main agitators. :lol:
WiseNLucky
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Post by WiseNLucky »

Here's a link to my latest thread-starter from over at "that other board."


I have to say that you all occasionally whet my appetite to see the carnage over there. But I have never been back to TMF since the fee kicked in. Not even to read. And I believe (but am not sure) there are others here who are in the same boat as me.

So posting a few outtakes would be helpful for us here to get the gist if you want us to stay informed. :D

WiseNLucky
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therealchips
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Are the fools raising rates?

Post by therealchips »

From what you say, it appears that the (self-styled) Fools are raising their rates. I didn't know that. I spend no time over there since they introduced their charges. How much will their total revenues drop when new higher fees kick in and participants scatter?
He who has lived obscurely and quietly has lived well. [Latin: Bene qui latuit, bene vixit.]

Chips
JWR1945
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Post by JWR1945 »

raddr just wrote:
I just visited over there. It looks like the REHP may implode when the new fee kicks in. The emperor himself is apparently leaving as is another of the main agitators.

I posted this at the Town Center on the hocus makes a gutsy offer thread within the last week:
What is really interesting is the context of hocus's offer. intercst, the board's founder and board general, has been actively encouraging people to leave the Motley Fool and to go to his MSN board. hocus, in contrast, has been encouraging people to stay at the Motley Fool while inviting them to visit here as well.

Back in December (?) I wrote that hocus's efforts were noble. Back then, he replied that he was pissed off in a noble sort of way. hocus's actions are still noble. He has continued to take the high road.

It has been sad...and it continues to be sad...to see that board undermined by its own founder.

Have fun.

John R.
JWR1945
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Post by JWR1945 »

therealchips asks:
How much will their total revenues drop when new higher fees kick in and participants scatter?

If I understand it correctly, the Motley Fool's discussion boards have always operated at a loss...or, at best, at a very low profit margin...fee or no fee. TMFBogey is my source. He posts on Improve the Fool.

Of course, the discussion boards do contribute to the attractiveness of the overall product. In that way, they keep a number of core customers.

Actual dollar amounts are not available and the Motley Fool is not about to make them available. The Motley Fool is private. It does not have to disclose such information.

Have fun.

John R.
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Post by wanderer »

trust me, W&L, if you don't like off topic political rants, you don't want what is posted over there over here.:wink:

w
regards,

wanderer

The field has eyes / the wood has ears / I will see / be silent and hear
JWR1945
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Post by JWR1945 »

wanderer
trust me...you don't want what is posted over there over here.

Actually, hocus's original post (the one linked to at the beginning of this thread) is worth seeing. Otherwise...

Have fun.

John R.
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ElSupremo
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Post by ElSupremo »

Greetings WiseNLucky :)
But I have never been back to TMF since the fee kicked in. Not even to read. And I believe (but am not sure) there are others here who are in the same boat as me.


Same boat here. Mine is still afloat. :wink:
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Post by wanderer »

es -

i won't be abandoning this board for tmf. i really appreciate your work here. of course, with my OT political rants you may prefer that. :shock:this place is good enough and tmf doesn't provide the value you i get here (in addition to charging for it).

wanderer
regards,

wanderer

The field has eyes / the wood has ears / I will see / be silent and hear
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ElSupremo
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Post by ElSupremo »

Greetings wanderer :)

No argument here. :wink: You could post your off topic political rants on the Town Center board. I'm sure we'd enjoy munching on them over there. :D
"The best things in life are FREE!"

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hocus
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Post by hocus »

hocus's actions are still noble. He has continued to take the high road.

It's a kindness on your part to say that, JWR1945. I appreciate it.

Still, I worry that too much of that sort of talk sets me up for a fall. My primary motives here are not especially noble ones. My primary motives are self-interested ones.

People use discussion boards for a variety of purposes, and the purposes for which they use them influences their perception of value. There are reasons why it is so important to me that on-topic posting be permitted at the Motley Fool's Retire Early Home Page (REHP) board. It's not that I'm crazy. It's not that I don't appreciate what ES has done for us in setting up this place. It's not that I'm too dumb to see that there are more valuable exchanges of FIRE information at this board in a week than there are at the REHP board in a month.

The reason is that I am going to be working in this field for a long time, and the REHP board has features that cannot be replicated here or anywhere else. I need that board to be an effective resource for aspiring early retirees for me to be as successful as I would like to be in the work I do. I have more at stake in seeing that that board is brought back to health than most others do, and that's why I care more than most others in seeing that it happens.

This board is a wonderful resource. I see that. This board provides better FIRE insights than the other board. I see that too. Neither of those realities justifies the conclusion that I should allow the REHP board to go down the drain. It is an incredibly valuable resource. There are thousands of wonderful posts in the Post Archives over there. Motley Fool spends lots of money bringing eyeballs to that site and a good number of those eyeballs become enticed over time to check out the REHP board and thereby become intorduced to the possibilities of early financial independence. I want that to keep happening. I want it to happen more frequently than it has in the past, not less frequently.

I understand that most others are not in the same circumstances as me, and that for many others, it would not be a good use of time to go to this amount of effort trying to get the REHP back on track. It is worth it to me. I have thought the matter through carefully, and have come to the conclusion that it is worth it. To be sure, I need to place some limits on the amount of time I direct to the task. I am trying to do that. But the task is a terribly important one for the growth of the Retire Early movement.

On my list of "Most Important Resources on Planet Earth for Aspiring Early Retirees," the book "Your Money or Your Life" is Number One. The Post Archive at the REHP board is Number Two. For someone making a living at teaching and learning about this stuff, saving that board is a critically important goal.

The board is not what people think it is. It is not just the posts that appear from 10 or 12 regular posters. There are many, many people who paid $30 to Motley Fool who want that board to become useful again for a Learning Together experience. There were 70 people who voted in the Dec. 23 poll that "this board has gone to hell" with it's recent focus on personal attacks and off-topic posting.

Those 70 people matter to me. They matter to me a lot. I am going to do what I can to help them achieve what they want for the board. Not because I am so noble a figure. Because I want my eleven years of research into this field to pay off, and that board is a critical tool in my effort to have it do so.

Please try not to judge the entire board by the behavior of a few regular posters. The board is good. There are a few bad apples, that's all. For various reasons, it is hard for the information seekers to stand up to the bad apples. But some are trying, and some are beginning to find their way. Please do not form final opinions on the board as a whole until you see how this thing turns out. I believe that there will come a day when people on that board will be singing the praises of this board on a daily basis.

Most people on that board and most people on this board have the same exact life goal--to learn how to achieve financial independence early in life. Most people on that boards are our friends. They are in a spot of trouble now, and need a little help from those in a position to offer any. I am in such a position, and I am doing what I can. That's all. If it helps some people, that's fine. I like to think that my life's work will help some people. But I don't spend my days at the top of a mountain thinking up noble thoughts.

I am doing this for me, for you, for the other information seekers at this board, for the information seekers at the REHP board. When people ask who it is I am referring to when I use the word "we," that is the answer. "We" is my shorthand term for information seekers of the world, people seeking to learn about how to achieve financial independence early in life. There are more of them congregated at the REHP board than any place else on Planet Earth that I have yet discovered. So I am going to continue going there to talk to them from time to time. They are my companions on this lifelong search for knowledge that I am on.

I sometimes wish that some of my friends were a little more outspoken. I'll give you that. But you know what? The reason that the 70 don't get involved in flame wars on a daily basis is that they possess good sense. I respect them for it. When the opportunity opens up for them to talk about substance, they will join in. That's the bottom line for me. That's what matters. This board process junk is the mud we have to dig through to get to the gold we know lies at the bottom.

In recent weeks, I've caught a few glimpses of the yellow stuff. So my intent is to just keep digging. I don't even notice the mud too much anymore. It's been part of the experience over there for so long that it's just something in the background I hardly even see anymore. The mud doesn't matter. The gold matters. I am in this for the gold that is at the core of that board.

It used to be that the gold was just lying on the ground, and it was nice and easy to pick it up anytime you wanted. Now it takes a little work to get to the good stuff. So what? It's worth it. I have 11 years behind me of learning how much that gold is worth. And my firm conclusion is--it's worth taking a few hits here and there to get to the good stuff that that board is capable of providing.
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Post by JWR1945 »

hocus
Still.... My primary motives here are not especially noble ones. My primary motives are self-interested ones.

You have said almost all of this before...but never so eloquently.

Have fun.

John R.
therealchips
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Post by therealchips »

Do you recall when TMF changed the "default" setting on "Best of Boards" to exclude all non-stock boards? We were blocked from changing the default setting, on a personal basis, back to what we preferred. On August 2, 2001, Johnny Billions posted a comment on this abuse of TMF members. The substance of his message a week after that change was that the new Best Of listing had 82% of its listings devoted to just three companies, another 14% to other stocks, and nothing on early retirement, living below your means, index investing, or anything funny or social or political. He concluded I'm sure TMF members interested in Rambus, Apple or AMD are impressed with your new & improved Best Of feature. The rest of us are not.

I was just recalling this among other reasons for giving up on TMF and its management. TMF gave lip service to indexing, but evidently thinks that only stock researchers, market timers and active traders are worthwhile customers. TMF seems to have made a conscious decision to drive away the rest of us.
He who has lived obscurely and quietly has lived well. [Latin: Bene qui latuit, bene vixit.]

Chips
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