Happy to Be a Fool

by Jim Stevens
([email protected])

Burlington, VT (Sept. 21, 1998) -- Hi everyone and greetings from the Green Mountain State. First, I'd like to get one thing off my chest -- Hi, my name is Jim Stevens and I'm a Mechanical Investor. Welcome to Mechanical Investors Anonymous -- NOT. Since the Workshop founder bid us farewell, the talented men and women that staff the other areas of the Fool have been doing their level best to try and understand and satisfy The Workshop Reader. What might have seeped through is that they did this despite the fact that most of the Fool staff espouse different types of stock selection strategies and didn't follow this area closely.

As you've probably already heard, The Fool is going to continue the widely followed posting of the Workshop Model's Screens and Returns. Over the next couple of weeks I'll be taking on the details of collecting the data, running the screens, and sending in the "numbers" for publishing. I'll be writing a couple of columns a week here as well. Comments like, "Hey Stevens, with extensive practice you might be up to carrying Robert Sheard's water" will be taken as the kindest of compliments.

Who knows whether we can keep this place the lively and informative hot bed of cool new mechanical investing ideas that DowMan (Robert Sheard) made it into. If it does continue on, it will have to be a changed Workshop. The King has left the fiefdom. Fortunately for the serfs, he has left behind many of his gilded implements for us to tinker with. What's more, he has promised to occasionally visit and share new discoveries and further illuminate his older sorcery.

If we haven't met, or if you're new to the Workshop, hello. I've been squeezing my smiling mug through the Workshop gates since late 1996. Along the way I've had occasion to help gather the official data that was the basis for the Workshop Current Rankings for those times I filled in. I've also pitched in on the message boards, sharing the Foolishness I've learned. Hanging around here has changed the way I invest as well as my outlook on my financial future. Wow, it's been fun.

Another great thing about this place is the virtually endless stream of quick-witted industrious brainstormers that show up here in all their market-savvy, number-crunching glory. For fear of leaving folks off that very long list I'm not naming Fools, but everyone in the Workshop Web and AOL message areas knows some of the people I mean. We love you! Calling all Workshoppers, email me your take on how you see the Workshop evolving going forward. I'm one part of the team, and I'll be looking for your help!

Adios Amigos.
- Jim Stevens

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

What Happened to Robert Sheard?