Fourteen

By -

I am humbled, honored, and grateful to make the following statement: the Slope of Hope is fourteen years old today.

It all started off so simply:

firstpost

I am humbled, first of all, because one of the great ironies of my life is that Slope has historically been, let’s face it, a bear den, and yet it is more popular and feature-rich than ever, even though we are literally 16,000 points higher on the Dow now than when Slope began. The market has not exactly lined up for a “let the bears prosper” kind of environment during Slope’s lifetime, as this yearly chart clearly shows:

history

I am honored because so many people, from so many parts of the world, have chosen to make this little corner of the Internet part of their day. It has provided me a forum for my musings – – some worthwhile, some not so much – – and allowed us to collectively create a special community.

Finally, I am grateful that Slopers have, as a group, allowed me to create a living here (especially, God bless ’em, the premium members). This only occurred to me as I was writing this post, but the Slope of Hope is the longest job I’ve ever managed to hold down in my entire life! Longer even than Prophet! So the largest part of my professional career, if you want to call it that, has been right here on these pages.

So, now, over 23,000 posts later………after the coming and going of so many tens of thousands of people……..the creation of SocialTrade, SlopeCharts, SlopeRules, and our vivacious discussion forum………we’re all still here. I thank you, and I am so glad for the opportunity to provide something of value when I wake up every day.

fourteen