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Pastimes : Robin Dayne - Mastering your Emotions -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JB2 who wrote (2)	5/12/1999 1:38:00 PM
From: BudLong	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 121

JB, Thanks for posting your disagreement re: Robbins. If his seminars and books work for you or anyone else, I applaud that. I just think his marketing and presentation, particularly on the infomercial, brand him unfavorably as a huckster type not to be taken seriously. JMO Regarding NLP, dismissing it as hypnotism doesn't do the subject justice. NLP is the scientific study of how words affect one's impressions, thinking, feelings, and psyche, connotation vs. denotation -- it's all highly complex, and that's one of my objections to Robin's approach. Perhaps Robin and Tony have studied this subject formally, perhaps not. Unlike the case with many other subjects, you couldn't master the intricacies of NLP through real-world experience; there would be no substitute for in-depth university study. I doubt that Tony has any formal training in NLP, and if not, Robin calling him her NLP "Master" is a bit of a joke. Interesting to note that Robbins doesn't even call it NLP, but Neuro-Associative Conditioning -- perhaps an acknowledgement that he doesn't really know anything about NLP and instead invented his own hybrid, renamed body of knowledge, with a lot less science and a lot more New Age Human Potential stuff thrown in. Bud

To: JB2 who wrote (2)	5/23/1999 1:54:00 PM
From: William W. Dwyer, Jr.	Respond to of 121

JB2, I have read your posts on this and the other threads apparently initiated by Robin Dayne, and I want to say that I agree fully with your assessment of her. She doesn't really know what she's doing, and she makes it more clear with each posting. I attended what I believe was Robin's first seminar presented this past February in New Hampshire. There were approximately twenty traders or would-be traders in attendance. The seminar at that time cost approximately $1,500 and lasted five days. From her website, I noticed recently that she now offers a seminar costing more like $5,000. Two years ago I attended several Wade Cook seminars and I feel qualified to comment on Robin's and how it compares to other investment-related training. I have daytraded full time for two years and have attended several other seminars, most of which were very good and helpful. My experience has been that the more expensive seminars are generally the least worthy. First, let me say that I believe both Wade Cook and Robin Dayne are grossly unqualified to teach what they teach. Robin's association with Tony Robbins makes me particularly suspicious and skeptical. Wade Cook's seminars are not as bad because they at least get into trading strategies a bit. Both Wade's and Robin's seminars are way over-priced and dangerous to novice traders who tend to believe whatever they are told by self-proclaimed "Gurus and Masters." As you have pointed out in your posts, Robin is only trying to capitalize off the growing numbers of poor souls are are enticed into daytrading as a way of creating sudden wealth. It is the natural and undeniable greed and ignorance in all of us that allows people like Robin Dayne to pass herself off as a "Master" while taking a lot of our money for doing virtually nothing. For those who might be interested and inclined to pay Robin thousands of dollars for a few days of her "widsom," let me describe the seminar she gave in February. (1) One day she devoted one full hour to having a salesperson from Investors Business Daily give a sales pitch for the newspaper which, imho, has little or nothing to do with real daytrading. (2) On the second day she spent most of the morning "trying" to show the class how to logon to an mIRC chatroom, the room run by Ken Wolff, who appears to have a mutual promotion arrangement with Robin Dayne. They hype each other. Robin appeared to have little understanding of how to navigate mIRC channels, basically wasted a lot of our time trying to promote Ken Wolff's daytrading chatroom. (3) Every hour or two during the seminar, Robin stopped the class and had everyone write down what they had learned so far (took very little time, indeed). During this time she had an assistant in the room play music that seemed to be intended to motivate everyone in some way - "mood" music. Nothing to do with learning how to trade. (4) Frequently throughout the seminar, the class was made to stand and jog in place for five seconds, clap their hands together, and yell. This was to keep everyone awake. I was offended. Seemed like kindergarten. (5) Robin frequently hyped her private "one-on-one" coaching sessions where, for a hefty fee, she would schedule to speak with her clients on the phone periodically about their "feelings and emotions." Isn't that what Psychic Hotlines are for? (6) She spent a lot of time trying to sell some workbook she created, a "Trader's Journal," consisting basically of a bunch of blank pages where one could make notes during the trading day. Quite an expensive "notebook." (7) Prior to the seminar, Robin had given permission for attendees to make audiotape recordings of the presentation. However, at the beginning of the seminar she said her attorney "had a problem" with anyone making audiotapes. No further explanation was given. Now I can see why. Lawyers don't like evidence. (8) The seminar workbook was very poorly written and put together, having an unusually high number of errors, typos, mis-spellings, and omissions. The worst, most useless seminar workbook I have ever seen. Whoever put it together must have had no experience doing so. (9) Robin Dayne appeared unable to describe and explain many features of the CyBerTrader software she was using throughout the seminar, which had been promoted as being designed especially for CyBerTrader users. In fact, she said that she had only started using it recently. It appeared she had very little, if any, experience using it. The extent of her demonstration of it was to look at one Level II window and watch the price levels change up and down. She did not use any charts, no technical indicators, no decision support tools, virtually none of the features included in CyBerTrader. The presentation was confusing at best, useless, and misleading. No one could have learned anything about trading. (10) Each day as questions arose about CyBerTrader, Robin would write them down and promise to answer them "hopefully (maybe) before the end of the seminar." One day in particular, toward the end of the day, she said she did not have time to go into some of the material scheduled for that class day, but she did find time to spend the last thirty minutes or so teaching us how to breath. We actually had to practice breathing in class. She said this was important, to be able to breath properly while trading. More important than reading charts? Can you believe? (11) She also stressed on numerous occasions how important it was for traders to drink enough water during the day. I could hardly keep from laughing as I noticed a few folks on the front row actually writing this down. (12) I noted that she started each class day approximately thirty minutes late and took 90 minutes for lunch. Yet she rarely had time to answer serious, substantive questions. Let me say that the above description is my personal recollection of how her seminar was run (based on my notes), and some of the comments are, of course, my own personal opinions, and that I have an obviously negative bias toward Robin Dayne and her seminar. Other persons who attended may have different thoughts and feelings about the seminar content. However, Robin did videotape the seminar and I seriously doubt she would ever show it to anyone. The evidence is there, though, if anyone is seriously interested. Another interesting point about Robin's seminar: the concept of "scrambles." I left the seminar early, but one fellow who stayed later sent me an email explaining Robin's scramble: ".....It's probably good that you did leave early though. As stupid as the running in place stuff was, it got worse. Robin did what she called "scrambles." She had one guy saying "I can't lose" in a high mickey mouse voice while walking backwards and wiggling his hands in front of his face. On the last day she asked for volunteers to do this as a group. Nice guys volunteered. Needless to say, I watched. Really strange." I should mention that I was extremely disappointed and disgusted and left Robin's seminar during lunch on the third day. I later asked Robin for a partial refund and she promptly and politely agreed. I strongly suggest that anyone planning to take any of her future seminars get a clear understanding of her refund policy in advance. You will probably want to exercise the option at some point. The important thing to point out, though, is that, notwithstanding Robin's calling her seminar "Intracacies of Daytrading," very little is mentioned about daytrading. This seminar is definitely not a "how to" seminar and would not benefit anyone who is seeking to learn how to daytrade. In fact, some mis-information is given out that could be harmful to unsuspecting students. As is done by most self-proclaimed "gurus," Robin spends most of her time telling everyone how good she is, how difficult daytrading is, how she makes herself available to those having trouble (everyone fits into this category) via telephone consultation (coaching sessions) for an additional fee. This is the real purpose of her seminar, to get new clients. And it's the purpose of her starting this thread on S.I. These gurus are not out to make the world a better place. They are clearly out to make money for themselves. My question is this: If Robin Dayne is such a good daytrader, why is she spending all her time developing and hyping her seminars, selling her tapes and printed materials, offering private coaching session? Couldn't she better spend her time daytrading and making money for herself? If she were really good at daytrading, wouldn't she be doing it? Another big question to which Robin has never responded: What is her formal educational background that relates to the topic in which she professes to be a guru? What, if any, are her professional credentials? I don't believe she has any. I truly do not. From watching her seminar, from reading her workbook, from seeing the way she can't navigate her way around S.I., from seeing the way she failed to properly describe CyBerTrader, I do not feel she is qualified in any way to do what she does. Unfortunately, there is little in the way of regulating the promotion, behavior, and marketing claims of these "Gurus and Masters." It is clear, though, that they all have one thing in common. Lacking proper credentials, they all recommend and hype each other. Thus we see the relationships between Robin and CyBerTrader, between Robin and Ken Wolff's chatroom, between Robin and I.B.D. She feels that pointing out her relationships with other, more established and accepted entities that she will achieve some credibility and acceptance for herself. JB2, I believe you have asked Robin to post her trading results to establish her credibility. That's good and I doubt she will do so, just as I doubt she will respond to my question about her relevant educational background and professional credentials. Anyone interested in learning how to daytrade would probably be much better off spending a few weeks or months surfing around the various legitimate S.I. threads and the multitude of well-run trading websites, reading, asking questions, studying, learning, investing a couple of hundred bucks at the Finance Section at Barnes & Noble. After all that, I would recommend avoiding most seminars (especially the expensive ones) and chatrooms. These only increase a traders's regular monthly costs and create harmful distractions, introduce possible misinformation. At least avoid chatrooms in the beginning. Learning how to trade is much better than learning how to follow someone else's advice. Nothing you can buy with a Visa Card will ever replace what you can and must learn through good old-fashioned experience......that means papertrading for a long time before committing real money to the art of daytrading. Again, let me make it very clear (if it isn't already) that all the above is strictly my opinion and is based on my own personal recollection of my experience at Robin Dayne's seminar, "Intracacies of Day Trading." Bill