At the peak of its popularity, isoHunt was one of the largest BitTorrent indexers on the planet.

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This new breed of indexers--not, in fact, indexers, but active strategists--focus on weighting portfolios by so-called fundamental factors.

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"All the liquidity needed by the indexers will already be there, " he said.

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They compare the traditional market-cap-weighted indexers with ancient astronomers who attempted to perpetuate the Ptolemaic view of an Earth-centered universe.

FORBES: About John "Jack" Bogle

"The great majority of funds are closet indexers, " he says.

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" The new fundamental indexers unabashedly answer, "We do.

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These questions are raised once again by this latest batch of stockmarket advisories, a set of four books which advocate everything from the slothful approach of Burton Malkiel's indexers to Peter Krass's hedge funders and options traders.

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To screen out such "closet indexers, " Prof.

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Globalisation is not the indexers' only worry.

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The more recent contributions in Peter Krass's collection include an essay by Warren Buffett, the famed Sage of Omaha whose investment approach, so-called focus investing, offers a third way between the indexers and active traders, and is the subject of a whole book by Robert Hagstrom.

ECONOMIST: Can you beat the blindfolded monkey?