Very Foolish.
The highlight of the evening for me was my chance to
meet Adam Rifkin.
Adam, a 29-year-old Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science
at Cal Tech, is
perhaps the prototype of this new kind of investor:
independent, committed
to learning, and dedicated to sharing his ideas with
the wide community that
is growing at an astonishing pace at www.fool.com. More
to the point, he is
best known to readers of The Motley Fool as
"IFindKarma". His thoughtful
posts are sought out by other Fools at a rate that
makes him one of our most
popular contributors. I'm afraid I embarrassed him when
I called his
contributions to our message boards "legendary," but
what other word did I
have for it? In spite of his excellent work, he seemed
genuinely surprised at
the impact his efforts are having. "How do you keep up
with all the email?"
he asked me.
Like I should know? Hey, Adam, you're the legend here,
not me.
Adam is at the front of a trend, a trend that
represents a shift in the way the
investment industry is structured. More and more,
investing is becoming a
cooperative endeavor, a community effort. Today's
investors, instead of
humbly offering the stewardship of their hard-earned
capital to some high
priest in the gold tower of some Manhattan cathedral,
are more and more
likely to organize themselves into groups, pool their
information, and, with the
counsel of their compatriots, make their own peace with
their financial affairs
in the comfort of their own hearts. If that sounds like
the reformation of a
centralized religion, then call me an evangelist. And
if religion it is, you might
be surprised at who is joining the congregation --
check out Bob Bobala's
Fribble describing a Foolish encounter with John C.
Bogle, founder of the
Vanguard Mutual Funds. Somebody say "Amen!"
Cheers,
Dave Orchard