Wednesday, May 6, 1998

The Daily Workshop Report
by Jerry Thomas (TMF Cheeze)

SHERMAN OAKS, CA. (May 6, 1998) -- Readers of this feature are used to the steady, calm voice of Robert Sheard. Robert is away from his keypad today, devoting his time to the telephone interviews that are part of the game of being a newly published author. Instead, you get me, and you can rest assured that while I don't come close to matching Robert's stock screening acumen, I more than make up for that deficit with my intense envy for the success of his new book.

The book in question, The Unemotional Investor, currently sits on top of Amazon.com's Hardback Nonfiction Bestseller List. That's Number One. Numero Uno. Ahead of Geoffrey Moore's Gorilla Game and Doctor Robert L. Kahn's Successful Aging.

Jealous? Me? Not a bit. Nope. Nuh-uh.

The book, it pains me to admit, is terrific. I picked up my own copy at Walden's the other night (being a remote staffer, a continent away from Fool Global Headquarters in Virginia, I can't sneak into FoolMart after hours and swipe one like everybody else).

Rarely will you find a subject more lucidly explained. While the Wise are working so hard to turn stock picking into rocket science, Robert simplifies and clarifies. And, thanks to the magic of cyberspace, readers of the book can interact directly with its author right here online. That's a powerful combination, unprecedented in the history of media.

There are advantages to both media, to be sure, but in combination I think the result presents an opportunity for understanding that an earnest student will find exponential rather than merely additive. Those who are familiar with Robert's work online might feel they already have a strong sense of his approach to investing. Indeed, that may be the case, but there is something valuable in finding the material expressed logically and progressively on paper in the form a book makes possible, which is hard to achieve online. Cyberspace is filled with links and wild connections that are thrilling in their own right, but for demonstrating an organized line of thought, it is often a disjointed and confusing means of expression.

Together, the advantages of the two media unite in a way that brings learning together in a way that can propel a serious student's understanding of the material beyond what you might have expected had you restricted your efforts to one media or the other. With the intersection of the printed word and the interactive powers of cyberspace, the work moves beyond ordinary pedantry and becomes a collaborative effort among all those who wish to contribute to the understanding of the community. Where I come from, that's called exciting.

This is a tremendous resource at your disposal, Fools. Robert himself epitomizes the autodidactic ideal we promote in Fooldom. You, an ordinary investor with ordinary skills, can achieve market returns that confound the experts. Robert tells you how, and tells you well.

The most amazing thing is, he was able to do all this without any help at all from me.

Dang.

Check out the latest file updates for the Workshop:
New Rankings | 1998 Returns | New Database

[Robert Sheard is the author of the The Unemotional Investor (Simon & Schuster, 1998) available now at Amazon.com and your local bookseller.]