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All I know is I've been trading for over 10 years, 4 full time and I can't imagine wasting so much time pumping out content/emails when the core of my business is actually trading. I also have some great one-of-kind indicators that I've designed and still use to this day. I've never sold any of them to anyone. I've given them away to less than 5 people over the 10 years I've been trading. I don't even care to waste time putting up a website, listing the indicators, shopping cart, etc. Why waste time and money on that when I trade markets to make money. That's what I'm good at. Other guys/girls are much better at pumping out content/emails about trading so they do a lot of that. That's great but they are not traders. They are content creators/bloggers.
This is, in my opinion, the best way to look at and evaluate offers of trading systems. The question is, what is the motivation, if the system is such a good one?
I will just add these things:
1) Who knows, someone might enjoy trading plus selling their system. It doesn't seem like the obvious thing in terms of self-interest, though, but maybe they would. Power to them then. I connection with this, I would not likely believe someone who says they just "want to give back to the community," a line we see sometimes. Maybe, but that's stretching the motivation question a lot, when they want to give back but it will cost you to get it. I'm going to just assume self-interest in that case, not helping out.
2) There are people, right here on FIO, who have put in a lot of time and effort providing trading tools and a lot of other help and shared knowledge for free to "the community." But they aren't selling anything when they give back, they are really just contributing. The same goes for people who post their trades and explain what they are doing. A person may or may not have that motivation, but it's easy to see the difference. (There's no money.)
3) There also are a number of vendors (and book writers) who do sell stuff that has tested out well and is liked by its users. They of course charge for it, as they should. I don't know if they trade or not, nor if they are any good at it, but they obviously added things up and decided it was worth their while in a business sense to put time and attention into their product, which has to limit any time spent trading. I guess they figure they are better off selling plus trading (if they trade) or just selling. Power to them too. Of course, this means their system/course/book may be useful but it's not going to make you rich, or you couldn't buy it from them.
The way the motivation question works out makes it important to believe very, very little of what is pitched to you as a trader, because you do have to ask that question, "Why is this offer being made, if the product is going to make me so rich?" We also need to be aware of our natural desire to get the secret that will unlock this trading puzzle. This is what makes it possible for others to make some easy money by selling their stuff, whether it's any good or not.
So we hope to find the good stuff, but there is always going to be more out there that is worthless. It's a let the buyer beware situation. Take due care and don't let go of your money easily.
@bobwest great post and agree with you on fio members that have created amazing tools to help traders in their endeavor. I'm not skeptical of those guys. If I had their talent in programming and was able to create those types of products you bet I would have a website with said products for sale. They sell tools to help traders create a system...not selling the system itself. Basically everything else besides those types of products makes me cringe.