A retrospective on one hundred posts

Last week marked a 100th post I have posted on this blog since about 2.5 years I've been blogging somewhat regularly. Today I would like to take a look back and do a bit of a retrospective on some things posted and an overall state of the blog.

General thoughts

Like most people, I get a lot of ideas on various subjects all of the time. Some are so-so, while others merit more contemplation. This is one of the reasons why I started writing this blog - to be able to formulate my thoughts, put them down somewhere and to be able to reference them later as needed - during online conversations, or when writing out other ideas.

It has really been a useful tool for me over the years - before I started writing the blog I would discuss some interesting ideas I had either without writing them down, or in random places over the Internet where I couldn't easily find them afterwards. This would usually mean I couldn't go into that much depth and the thoughts were more ephemeral.

A few months ago I was looking for some post on my blog and I stumbled upon the post about volatile currencies I have completely forgotten about at that point. It's perhaps not the most relevant or best written post out there, but it still contains an interesting idea nugget that might be a useful reference in the future. If I relied only on my memory, it would be gone.

With that in mind, lets look at some popular or interesting posts I have written over the years that you might've missed.

Top ten

Here are the ten most popular posts from this blog, based on the number of views:

1. On the subject of altcoins - do altcoins have any merit to exist?
2. On /r/Bitcoin moderation - three years in review - /r/Bitcoin moderation
3. Deniable proof of Satoshi - talking about Craig Wright's claim to being Satoshi and how future claims should be handled
4. Liquid - when sidechains say "fuck it" - pondering the Liquid network
5. Bitcoin historical rallies, halvenings and bubbles - talking about my experience with past bubbles
6. Why fast maturing altcoins are doomed to fail, or why $30 dollars a day is not enough to secure Quarkcoin - discussing Quarkcoin and its reward schedule
7. A killer feature for wallets and exchanges - an idea about how exchanges could help grow the value of Bitcoin
8. How to kill a currency - how could one go about destroying a cryptocurrency
9. Crypto 2.0 systems - comparing various Crypto 2.0 systems
10. Mining versus Consensus algorithms in Crypto 2.0 systems - the consensus algorithm and its impacts on a cryptocurrency

Generally, not a bad cross-section of the blog - talking about Crypto 2.0s a number of times, criticising some projects that have some objectionable features, talking about some ideas I still wait to be implemented, etc. Some information is starting to get a bit outdated (I would've expanded the good list to include projects like Ethereum), but overall I can't complain.

Other good posts

The above posts got the most views. However, there are some other posts that I'm proud of. Maybe they got unlucky when they got posted, or the ideas presented are rather niche, but they might be still worth checking out:

• MintChip, what it could've been... - an overview of Mintchip, a government-backed cryptocurrency
• Smart contracts and the demise of copycoins - heralding the end of copycoins
• Redefining "currency" - talking about what should constitute a currency in the modern world
• PFG - some games are more fair than others - talking about Provably Fair Gambling
• The paradox of presales - pondering Gems - a short perspective on token presales in general
• Crypto success vs. Bitcoin success - can Crypto succeed even if Bitcoin won't?
• The need for a new measurement of value - trying to decouple measurement of value from the value itself
• The rise of fiat-denominated cryptos - an overview of various categories of fiat-denominated cryptos
• Governments - do your job. Give us unique digital signatures! - specking out some ideas of how to implement a better ID system
• Inert versus volatile currencies - pondering an attack on BitUSD - talking about why currencies based on futures might be problematic
• BitUSD vs USD IOUs - comparing two approaches to creating a fiat-pegged currency
• Bitcoin vs Blockchain - trying to figure out whether a blockchain without a currency is useful
• Who stands to benefit from a spam attack on the Bitcoin network? - some tinfoil hat ideas on who could be attacking the Bitcoin network
• Death of Satoshi - a discussion on whether we should be dragging Satoshi into the current problems
• 21 Bitcoin Computer - the Macintosh of Bitcoin - an in-depth look at the 21 Computer and whether it has any merits
• Positive and negative proofs in blockchain audits - using the blockchain to achieve what the current audits can't
• The Dark Wiki - using the blockchain to create unstoppable spread of information
• Nobody needs Counterparty - a discussion on needs and wants - pondering whether one should dismiss projects that are a sub-optimal solution for the job
• Perfection or bust - the rise and fall of The DAO - talking about The DAO and how to avoid similar future problems

Conclusions

Thank you everyone for sticking with me for the one hundred posts. If you find your mind similarly teeming with ideas, my advise to you would be to put them to writing. You may never know when your past self will surprise you with interesting thoughts that would otherwise flee.