sorry, your arguments are based on flimsy or at best inconclusive evidence…
Let me first say that I’m not totally sure of either views.
The % unsubscribers if of course an objective measure of the % unsubscribers, but it is not an objective measure of system performance because (1) it is not clear how system performance affects the % unsubscribers, and (2) it is not clear how other factors affect the % unsubscribers. For example,
- people may leave because the system is in a drawdown, or they may stay because the system is in a drawdown
- people may leave because the vendor is unfriendly to Ross, or they may stay because the vendor is unfriendly to Ross
So with this statistic C2 would make a leap from reporting financial facts and informed opinions to a kind of popularity contest without arguments.
"If I know the probability of unsubscribing is 80%, I must have a lot of confidence that I’m somehow different from the “typical” subscriber before it makes sense for me to subscribe."
But you won’t know the profile of the typical subscriber, so this implies that you will always follow the herd even though you have no idea why they unsubscribe. Well, there is a theory that the majority will often take the best decision… I would not use that strategy, but the relevant question is why I don’t want C2 to help you with using that strategy. Hmm, I’ve no answer to that.
There are some practical complications. Since you won’t know the number of subscribers, you won’t know how reliable the % unsubscribers is. Since the (un)subscribers will not be independent anymore, the % may not stabilize. How to prevent that vendors subscribe & unsubscribe to other systems in order to give that system a bad figure? How to prevent that they do the opposite with their own systems?
You don’t consider trial periods and rotation of curiosity
Ok, so it should be the % of unsubscribers within 1, 3 and 6 months after the end of the trial period. This should also provide systems that look better on C2 than in real-life with an incentive to offer a trial. Rotation out of curiosity falls into the same category as “may want to put funds into other areas, their lifetstyle changes, they can’t monitor trades, they become ill or infirm, etc. etc. etc.”, i.e. it belongs to a base level of subscriber turnover that every system has. Again, what is of interest are systems for which % of unsubscribers clearly falls above or below this base level.
So you’ll need additional stats that will shows unsubscribtion by some categories, right? e.g length of subscribtion
This is why I proposed % of unsubscribers within 1, 3 and 6 months. Again, it should be counted from the point the trial ends.
"Rotation out of curiosity falls into the same category as “may want to put funds into other areas, their lifetstyle changes, they can’t monitor trades, they become ill or infirm, etc. etc. etc.”, i.e. it belongs to a base level of subscriber turnover that every system has."
I doubt that the base level is the same for all systems. I would expect that it is much higher for forex system than for stock systems, and different for daytrading than for long term systems. OTOH, “no statistic is perfect”, perhaps that should be applied here as well?
>people may leave because the vendor is unfriendly to Ross, or they may stay because the vendor is unfriendly to Ross
you mean people may leave because the vendor is unfriendly to Ross, or they may stay because the vendor is friendly to Ross…
I disagree. People may leave because they refuse to accept in return for their achievements curses, robbery, and enslavement and C2 does nothing about it but infact aids and encourages it. People may stay because at C2, the good is left free to achieve values and enjoy them…
Science Trader
Ok, so it should be the % of unsubscribers within 1, 3 and 6 months after the end of the trial period.
You forgot that majority of C2’s system has minimal trial period or none. How are you going to figure out real subscribers in the cases?
You need at least length of subscription for that, otherwise you won’t be able recognize curiosity and real guys/girls. And from the point we come back to private info of C2 and a system vendor. Simply you want to calculate number of subscriber per a system.
IMHO the info has no stats value. hehe Only if you want to be sure that you’re loosing not alone lol It’s simplified crowd opinion. Nothing more.
This should also provide systems that look better on C2 than in real-life
C2 already offers RF. It’s not perfect, but it’s usable.
Jules Ellis
"no statistic is perfect", perhaps that should be applied here as well?
But some stats is useless, because it’s not stats. perhaps that should be applied here as well? 
Eu
I think that is correct, so unsubscription rates for a stock system should be compared to the average across all stock systems.
I also agree that such a measure should not be interpreted as an overall measure of performance. It should have an unambiguous name (% unsubscribers), and come with no qualitative judgment about "good" or "bad" levels.
Its primary value is when a system has a nice looking equity curve and stats, but somehow unsubscription is much higher compared to its peers. In that case potential subscribers might want to dig deeper and understand why that is the case: vendor attitude, unrealistic slippage, missed trades, unrealistic stop and limit fills etc. etc.
No, I wrote it correctly. I was hinting at the heterogeneity of the population. Person A may leave for a reason while person B stays for the same reason. Like person A can be unhappy because his wife left him, while person B is happy because his wife left him.
As a subscriber (and unsubscriber) to about 15-20 systems since summer 2005 there are only two things that matter to me when searching for a trading system on C2:
1) Does the system satisfy my personal preferences for trading vehicles, time frames, style, risk, etc. The basic sorting tools can narrow down the field substantially, but it takes more digging to check on unrealistic tactics like high volume trading in penny stocks, scalping that even autotrading can’t keep up with, averaging losers excessively, etc.
2) Can real account trading match (within reasonable slippage) what C2 shows for the trade record and system stats. If not, then none of the displayed stats mean diddly, and the only way to really find out is to trial the system. User reviews could also help, but there aren’t nearly enough of these showing actual trade results (either autotrading or manual). I unsubscribed to over half of the systems I tried out purely for this reason (ie. my real account results were far worse than C2 shows), and the rest mainly because they headed south soon after I subscribed and I just happened to catch the equity peak after watching for a month or two (and most of these never recovered, although one did and I didn’t weather the drawdown).
I’m subscribed to two systems now, both slower stock systems that can be easily manually traded and are doing well at the moment. The only stats I look at are %winning trades, average winner to average loser, and projected annualized return. A relatively smooth equity curve with a positive slope is also crucial. The bottom line is whether my real trading account grows in value over time at a rate that roughly matches what C2 shows for that system, and if it does I’ll stay subscribed until things stop working.
Only ~3% of Tango subscribers were system vendors from C2.
That’s encouraging. Thanks.
Then, what would be the advantage over just reading the reviews?
>The bottom line is whether my real trading account grows in value over time
In other words, it is the end result that counts. Thank you…
Yes … within the constraints of a relatively smooth, positively-sloping equity curve and tolerable (<10%) drawdowns. But I should point out that I am not looking for super high risk systems to gamble 5-10% of my investable capital on in hopes of an astronomical return (and there are many shoot-for-the-moon systems on C2 evidently aiming only for that goal). Someone looking for that type of system (eg. maybe they keep 90% of their money in a more traditional stock or mutual fund portfolio and gamble with 10%) is certainly a different C2 system shopper than I am. So an individual’s “investment” goals must also be taken into account if trying to make sense of subscriber/unsubscriber percentages or some similar thing here. Give me an Extreme-OS equity curve (RF factor included) that can be realized in an actual trading account of any size and I’d be a very happy camper!
Understood. I may have something like that in the pipeline. I call it my Magnum (Opus), all others are just overtures. Once again, thankyou…
Reporting unsubscription behavior shows what people do. Reviews show what they say. I prefer to know the former before I believe the latter. In some cases the latter might help me understand the former.
E.g. if I’d see negative reviews but few people unsubscribing, I would take those reviews with a grain of salt.
Hey Sam, have we been here before?..Jon
> Hey Sam, have we been here before?..Jon
No. If a vendor decides he wants to share his private info
(say he makes a public post on a public forum that he has 29
subscribers) that is up to him.
OTOH, for MK to share private info about
the vendors (without their permission) is like posting info
about private emails (without permission) on a public forum.
Sharing private information about someone else is unethical.
Understand the difference Jon?
For the record: I"ve seen that 29 number a few times in various threads. My number was 24. If I said 29 I was lying, and I was wrong…Jon
Make it 25, Welcome aboard GB!
> Make it 25, Welcome aboard GB!
OK, so you are grossing $7500 / mo in fees right?
25 x $300 = $7500.
Very Nice! You da man!
