I stated 2018 by challenging myself to post every day during the month of January. Since I try make sure my posts have at least a bit of value to the platform, posting daily was quite grueling and time-consuming. I did not manage to post on two occasions during the month, but posted twice in the same day on another. This means that I managed 30 posts in 31 days during the month of January, so I'm going to pat myself on the back and pretend I was successful.

But what was really important to me is that this was an extremely positive experience and I showed myself that I'm capable of constancy on the Steem blockchain (despite the fact that I took 3 days off from posting as soon as my challenge was over). Doing this challenge was really rewarding as the Steem platform had to become an integral part of my daily routine and I thoroughly enjoyed constantly interacting with the community.

A Huge Thank You!

I was inspired to do this challenge by @deirdyweirdy and the way she aced the Alphabet Art Challenge and by @dragosroua who created his own January 30 Day Challenge. I really want to thank the people and communities who kept me going with their support. I really appreciate the most faithful reader and supporter I have ever had - @deirdyweirdy. I'm also really thankful for the highly reputable people who started autovoting my work like @crimsonclad, @ausbitbank and @discordiant - this is an honor that is truly humbling!

Of course, I also have to mention the awesome communities and projects who deemed some of my posts worthy of an upvote like @steemstem, @steemiteducation, @curie and @sndbox. Those projects and the awesome people trailing their votes were responsible for the majority of my January author rewards.

Thank you to everybody that ever took the time to read, comment or upvote a post of mine! It's hard to express my gratitude...

My Most Recent Word Cloud

^{Source: Steem Reports}

The world cloud created using my latests posts looks a bit different than last time I posted one.

Contests

During January I had the privilege of running two different contests which received more than 50 entries and allowed me to give away a total 16.84 SBD to 11 different steemians. Besides giving away some prizes, I also managed to get some as I was among the winners in contests by @sndbox and @digitalking.

The Stats

More than half of the 30 posts I made in January received more than 10 comments (my own replies included in that number). Exactly half of my posts received more than 30 upvotes and none got under 10.

On average, my posts earned 7.65 SBD and 1.515 SP with two thirds of my posts falling below that mark. Only 8 of my posts earned more than 10 SBD this month and only managed 3 earned more than 20 SBD. With a few posts not having paid out yet, I've included expected rewards as displayed at Steem.Supply.

You can view the stats of all my posts from January below (ordered by SBD earned).

Post	Upvotes	SBD	SP	Comments
The Paradox of Non-Transitive Dice and Our Imperfect Intuitions	144	39.644	6.572	13
A Sea Slug That Uses Photosynthesis (Much Like A Plant)	71	30.714	6.066	13
The Birthday Paradox and Our Awful Human Intuitions When It Comes to Probabilities and Exponents	105	27.13	5.958	15
The Amazon Molly - An All-Female Fish Species	86	15.438	3.553	3
There is a better way to refer to this community than to call it Steemit	43	14.169	3.263	35
Join My First Steem Challenge/Contest: Your 2017 Top 5 (And Win SBDs)	128	13.968	2.411	161
The AI-Powered Art Contest - Let's Create Some Creepy Animals With The Help Of Algorithms And Earn SBDs!	37	13.288	2.73	48
Steem Stats Animated Video Infographic	36	13.202	3.151	12
Some steemSTEM animated signature gifs for your science posts	81	8.576	1.504	17
The Simplest Tool a Teacher or Parent Should Never Forget - The Question	57	7.966	1.757	8
Let's not kid ourselves - Facebook is never launching a cryptocurrency	25	5.793	1.111	4
The dev team is obviously working on steemit behind the scenes. And I'm giving Busy.org a spin.	40	4.09	0.662	2
Happy New Year! (and some personal thoughts on 2017)	38	3.445	0.546	7
If the law was up to you, would this be illegal? What about moral?	26	3.337	0.582	28
How businesses could use the STEEM blockchain to popularize their brands	23	3.232	0.536	7
If you were the judge, who would you find guilty and of what crimes?	19	3.209	0.561	4
Five Facts About Me (I Jump on the Bandwagon Uninvited)	31	2.626	0.556	24
Most movies out there are unrealistic because they all cater to a fetish we all share	37	2.34	0.386	3
I Bet You Have Signed Illegal Stuff at Least Once in Your Life	22	2.052	0.349	12
The AI-Powered Art Contest Gallery and Winners (Everybody's a Winner!)	20	1.911	0.318	15
Mark Zuckerberg Is Either Dishonest Or Delusional Yet Again And An Opportunity For STEEM	19	1.808	0.435	13
Halfway Through The January 30 Day Challenge	21	1.75	0.361	18
#my2017top5 Contest Winners Announcement	25	1.738	0.4	23
Why Implementing A Two-Way Conversion SBD Hard Peg Makes Zero Sense	18	1.608	0.329	11
Janet Airlines - The Secret Airline Operated By The US Government You Could Snoop Around On Too	19	1.339	0.292	5
Supporting Organizations Can Be Hard In A World That's Not Black & White	20	1.214	0.268	5
Choose Your Words Wisely: How SayingSomething Honest Cost A Company A Billion	14	1.179	0.227	6
There is a way to use more than 5 tags on your post?	37	1.155	0.266	6
My 2017 Top 5 Challenge Promo Video (60% of the liquid rewards go to prizes too)	15	0.804	0.159	1
Challenge Accepted: January 30 Days Writing Challenge (Plus Free Gifs For Participants)	12	0.766	0.14	13
Average:	42.3	7.65	1.515	17.73
Total:	1269	229.491	45.449	532

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Thank you for reading and for the support! I really appreciate it!

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