The short version:
talked a bit about the piece on a family's first fund and the notion of slow, steady, manageable gains. Highlighted the James Balanced: Golden Rainbow profile that Charles did and TIAA-CREF Lifestyle Conservative piece of mine.
in the "hold it or fold it" segment (viewer requests about individual funds):
Akre: great fund, distinct biases, a manager who's younger than Buffett but ...
Driehaus Emerging Growth: great fund but I'd look at their Emerging Small Cap Growth first. Two reasons - more interesting asset class and the presence of an options hedge that has reduced its volatility below the large cap fund's.
Vanguard Selected Value: it delivers what Litman Gregory promises, a collection of distinctive outside managers whose styles are complementary. Really nice risk-return profile, low expenses.
Manor Growth: meh. Seems risk-conscious, okay returns, nothing to write home about, nothing to flee.
Mentioned after the break: Diamond Hill Small Cap. They're in the red zone for closure. Over $1.6 billion with a strategy capacity in the $1.5-2.0 billion range. I have no inside information or special insight here but ...
David

Find an allocation that meets your risk tolerance and long-term goals, keep cash needed from the portfolio in the next 5 years in CDs, cash or short-term bonds, then turn off the financial channels & don't listen to talk radio (both of which are a waste of time that could be spent doing something positive). And remember that the vast majority of people have NO money to worry about.

This seems very strange, but I have a math question for everyone smarter than I in that area:
Once you are down to the 2% and lower SWR, is it not the case that you might as well put it all under the mattress and take out what you need till it's gone, given life expectancies? In other words, say you really can live on 20k, 2% of a million, plus some inflation, and are say 62 (trying to be worst-case or stupidest-case here). 20k a year, okay, inflated appropriately. How many years does 20k last divided into a million even if you allow for inflation? Is it less than 35? I suppose it must be. Okay, put it all into bonds.

Why would anyone ever do 10% bonds at age 35?

What would your recommendation be?

Pure robots are definitely faster - the data are "untouched by human hands".
The impression I get of mass marketed portfolio management services (e.g. Fidelity Portfolio Advisory Services) is that they have a few different portfolios (possibly comprised of a gazillion funds, likely built with "robotic" assistance), and they match you to the closest portfolio. For their 1% fee or so, they provide some handholding ("stay the course"), and talk to you.
Vanguard provides a financial plan, and I'm confident uses the "robotic" tools to allocate investments based on longer discussions with you, and what your needs and time frames are. A bit less cookie cutter. John Markoff talks about AI vs IA (intelligence augmentation); Vanguard would appear to be taking the latter approach.
He was on CSPAN a week ago, talking more generally about robots replacing humans:
http://www.c-span.org/video/?327812-5/washington-journal-john-markoff-robots-manufacturing

90% equities?
My 'inner-robot' is screaming 'Danger Will Robinson'....
Someone help me out here --- I guess I just don't get the "robo-adviser" fad... Seems more like marketing the sizzle, rather than delivering the steak. These retail brokerages are demonstrating they are "doing something", so they can seem to show they are adding value. Is a robo-adviser for investors too lazy/stupid to rebalance their own portfolio? If so, is an investor who is too stupid to rebalance, someone who should be 90% exposed to the equity markets?
15-16 years ago, would Vanguard's fully human advisor have provided the exact same allocation recommendation to a 35-year-old? If so, how does adding a "robot" improve things. Frankly, I would be more concerned with any broker who suggested a 90% stock allocation in 1999 -- when it would have failed so miserably -- then invests (how much) in a robo-program which delivers the same result in the 6th year of a bull market..
By the way, are Vanguard robo-human advisers cyborgs/bionic? Are they better than the fully human advisers? Better, stronger faster?

Just as a reminder: RNDLX is very different from RNCOX. If you haven't, you might want to glance at the Observer's profile of RiverNorth DoubleLine Strategic Income. RNCOX allocates between CEFs and ETFs, depending on the opportunities available. RNDLX allocates between fixed-income CEFs and two separate strategies run by Jeffrey Gundlach; Mr. G's work has nothing to do with CEFs. Currently it's 54% CEFs and 46% DoubleLine.
Here's the fund's homepage if you'd like to poke about.
David

Hi, golub!
In the September 2015 update, I left the description of the two portfolio sleeves alone since they haven't changed and I thought they were reasonably clear. The most substantial parts of the rewrite were my attempt to explain that the options part of the portfolio does not transform this into a low-vol / market neutral fund. The managers believe in value investing and have construct a reasonably risky portfolio of value stocks. If in the short-term those stocks go down, the fund goes down. The effect of the options is to generate income which partially offsets the downside; the best explanation I've got is that the long portfolio + options should decrease in value less than the long portfolio alone would.
I understand that the options strategy is complicated, all the more so become there are many types of options. The shortest explanation for what exact the Gargoyle folks do comes from their website: "The long portfolio is complemented by a highly-correlated short portfolio of relatively overpriced near-term call options on various equity indices." If you're interested in the under-the-hood part, that is, the detailed description of the function of the various sorts of options, you might read the Equity Options Primer. If you Google the phrase "selling options to reduce portfolio volatility," you'll find explanations from Russell, JP Morgan, Eaton Vance and BlackRock that all attempt to explain, and occasionally quantify the effects of, the strategy.
There is a buy-write index (BXM) that's tradable. If you go to the CBOE's microsite for the buy-write index, you'll find links to the research on the strategy. The shortest version is this: a passive S&P 500 buy-write strategy is about 30% less volatile than the S&P 500 but, over the long term, returns just a bit more than the S&P. As a result, its various risk-return measures are significantly higher than a long-only portfolio's.
For what that's worth,
David

@bee posted: "The Robo service requires $50K and costs (.5%) and here's its portfolio"
@Sven posted: "Also which part if robo (algorithms driven) and which is human to justify the 0.5% fee?"
+++++++++++++++
just to clarify, the fee is 0.3%, not 0.5%
Cheers

Why would anyone ever do 10% bonds at age 35?

Not sure I understand the question . If you think its too few bonds I sort of agree but there are plenty of people that age who are 100% in equities. If you think its too many bonds I would argue that its always good if a bear market occurs to have a source of funds to add to equities

Why would anyone ever do 10% bonds at age 35?

@bee, sorry that I missed your earlier question. I think they are similar in the portfolio makeup. Question is how frequent do they rebalance? Also which part if robo (algorithms driven) and which is human to justify the 0.5% fee?
Schwab's has similar product, Intellegent Portfolio. I need to look into it to better understand their differences.

details.http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/intelligent_portfolios

WHY 4% COULD FAIL
Sep 1, 2015 • Wade Pfau & Wade Dokken
http://www.fa-mag.com/news/why-4--could-fail-22881.html
Our research shows that Americans retiring in 2015 need to be far more conservative in their withdrawal rates during retirement. The historic 4% annual withdrawal rate is over two times the level that Americans can safely withdraw without expecting to outlive their assets. The real safe withdrawal rate, accounting for fees and today’s stock and bond market levels, is under 2% per year.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Above is a link to a very interesting article that explores impediments to current implementation of a 4% (+ subsequent inflation adjustments) retirement withdrawal rate.
However, the version of the article in the Financial Advisor Magazine ("FA Mag") Sep 2015 issue is a little confusing for a couple of reasons.

First, the article as rendered (either in print or online) suffers from typos or mis-referenced figures that make it more difficult to follow than it should be.
Second, some key assumptions do not appear in the article but can only be found in the appendix of the related whitepaper. These relate to the mutual fund costs and financial advisor fees.
Specifically, a financial advisor fee of 100 bps, and average mutual fund expense ratios of 67 bps for stocks and 60 bps for bonds.

Below is the whitepaper link which appears at the beginning of the FA Mag article. NOTE: It asks for name and contact information. Whitepaper contains assumptions in an Appendix and the whitepaper's figures are properly referenced and completely labelled. I suggest you read the Appendix first.
WHITEPAPER
http://www.fa-mag.com/rethinking-retirement-wealthvest-0815
And here - from Professor Pfau's website/blog is page with references and links to earlier papers on related topics :

WADE PFAU RETIREMENT RESEARCHER READING ROOM & BLOG
http://retirementresearcher.com/reading/
http://retirementresearcher.com/blog/
-----------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE
Wade Pfau is Professor of Retirement Income at the American College for Financial Services in Bryn Mawr, PA.
Wade Dokken is Co Founder & Co President of WealthVest Marketing, a firm that designs, markets, and distributes fixed and fixed index annuities.

Seems to be a couple ongoing threads on the same subject.
ZEOIX has held up better over the last month and year to date. But I do have a concern about this fund's risk. Zeo Strategic Income has 32% invested in its top 5 holdings. There are only 31 holdings across the board. So this fund is very concentrated. Maybe not as concentrated as a Bruce Berkowitz fund, but still doesn't have any diversification. Okay RPHYX has few holdings too, but is a little less focused.

Maybe you have seen it already, but I would check out ZEOIX on MFO as a Great Owl Fund. It has very good numbers for risk, SD, Ulcer Index, etc.

Wellesley is generating income from taxable bonds, taxable as ordinary income. VTMFX is generating income from tax-free munis, and qualified dividends taxed at lower cap gains rates. So its $2K of income is worth more after tax than the first $2K of income from Wellesley. That narrows the gap, even for current income. And VTMFX should have more long term growth (higher percentage of equity).
I'm offering no opinion (in this post) on which fund is the better choice. Just commenting on the figures. The quality of the distributions (ordinary income, qualified income, or tax free) for the funds are different. Enough so that for any tax bracket one ought to take a closer look at the perceived income gap.
In addition, M* reports trailing twelve month yield from Wellesley as 3%, not 5% (VTMFX's trailing yield is indeed 2%). So even pre-tax, the gap may not be as wide as suggested.
I believe that claimui's 5% figure comes from the 2% of cap gains that Wellesley distrbuted last year. So one fund recognizes 2% in cap gains, while the other "lets it ride". You should be able to get similar (capital gain) income out of VTMFX by selling the shares when you want. If you need that gain as current income then sell shares periodically, otherwise the deferral of gain may be an advantage.

FYI: Put the Linkster in the 10% rally camp ! (Click On Article Title At Top Of Google Search)
Wall Street’s top strategists are bullish on U.S. stocks through the end of this year and into 2016. Why they like technology, financials.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.google.com/#q=U.S.+Stocks+Could+Rally+More+Than+10%+by+Year+End++barron's

FYI: Whenever the stock market is acting nutty, my hair gets shorter.
Not from pulling it out, but rather because I enjoy heading down to Pat’s Barber Shop and chatting with the guys about the market.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/how-to-keep-this-crazy-stock-market-from-driving-you-nuts-2015-09-06/print

VWINX is a newly added holding for me. Given that it has income as a main goal (and even "income" in the name), I am not sure it is suitable in a taxable account unless you do indeed want the income. That said, I took a quick look at the past distributions of VWINX vs. VTMFX, and I crudely estimate the annual income to be about 5% for VWINX vs. 2% for VTMFX. So if you're investing, say, $100k, then that comes out to be about $3000 of extra taxable income for VWINX vs. VTMFX. Depending on your tax bracket, that may or may not be a big deal.

I wonder how many fall into my category. Over the years I collected a large number of fund mostly good ones.While I would not now buy at least 10 of the funds I own I do not wish to sell for tax reasons though I would sell if they started doing badly but its more they have been mediocre(one example I will sell when the manager dies is Gabelli Asset) as I resent the management fees.A fund I certainly would not buy today is Acorn.They are fairly easy to manage since I mostly take action in Roth and 401k accounts where taxes are not a concern raising or lowering equities depending on my view of market prospects but I never take very big moves..For about two years I have been nervous about the market but the action I took in taxable accounts was to stop reinvesting dividends. I used the income to take trips, eat out more and buy i bonds when the rate was reasonable. I regret that money market funds pay little and have not purchased a CD in at least 5 years.

50 funds..... Talk about over-diversification.