It's common for newcomers to be impressed when they see certain posts receiving high payouts, especially when someone seems to be doing well on a fairly consistent basis. It shakes their idea that it's all a big slot machine and suggests that there may be more at play - maybe even something underhanded. In the past, I've been able to show them posts from my first month to prove that I actually started from zero, just like everyone else, and had to invest time and effort in the development of my reputation and following here. Unfortunately, I can no longer do that because everything I posted before three weeks ago has vanished!
Not only are all my posts from my first couple of months missing from my blog page but they don't even show up when searched for. I'm guessing this must be an unintended side-effect of a recent website update and it's not the end of the world, but it does leave me in a bit of a quandary. Everything is still on the blockchain so I can dig it all up and repost it manually but if it's easy enough for the developers here to fix the problem in an upcoming update, that would be great too. I'm hoping one of them reads this and can advise me on the best way to proceed.
As it stands now, it appears that my posts have always done very well here, which is most certainly not the case. I floundered in obscurity at first too, just like most people do, and I like to be able to show that to newcomers so as to reassure them and inspire them to hang in there when they feel like they're feeling invisible. There are plenty of obvious examples of people that got lucky and struck it rich with their very first post but I think it's also important to demonstrate that there's still a longer road to success that can be traveled with good old-fashioned commitment, perseverance, and the willingness to supply value to meet a market's demand.