Blog Archives
Meet π’s cousin, φ
So what’s that symbol, you ask? It’s the Greek letter Phi (pronounced FEE).
We’ve all heard of the (in)famous π, or 3.14159265358… Our math teachers pounded this into our heads every year, and the nerds would always hold competitions to see who could recite the most digits of pi. So far, computers have sputtered out over 5 trillion digits of pi.
But another number, just as beautiful as pi, is relatively unknown to the masses. That number is phi, or 1.61803399… It is the number that satisfies the following algebraic equation: (a+b)/a = a/b.
There are many ways of expressing this golden number:
As an infinite series,
As a continued fraction,
As a continued square root, which bears striking resemblance to the above:
But wait, there’s even more:
φ^2 = φ + 1,
and even more surprisingly,
1/φ = φ – 1. Wow!
If that surprised you, this will truly give you a shock:
φ to the nth power is equal to the sum of the previous two integer powers of φ. Check this out:
- φ^3 = φ^2 + φ^1
- φ^4 = φ^3 + φ^2
- φ^n = φ^(n-1) + φ^(n-2)
The same thing goes with negative powers! Try it out!
Thought it couldn’t get even more fascinating? WRONG!
Compare the digits after the decimal point in this table:
| n | phin | phi-n |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1.61803398875 | 0.61803398875 |
| 3 | 4.23606797750 | 0.23606797750 |
| 5 | 11.09016994375 | 0.09016994375 |
| 7 | 29.03444185375 | 0.03444185375 |
| 9 | 76.01315561752 | 0.01315561752 |
Lo and behold, the decimal parts in the latter 2 columns are exactly the same! Also notable: this relationship does not exist if n is an even number.
For those of you who are still reading, there is a special link between phi and the Fibonacci series:
Let F(n) = 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, …
WHOA! Who knew?
January 2010 Blog Report
| Statistic | Value | Change from previous month |
| Number of views | 483 | +18.9%, +76 |
| Number of days |
31 | 0%, 0 |
| Average views/day | 15.6 | +18.7%, +2.45 |
November 2009 Blog Report
| Statistic | Value | Change from previous month |
| Number of views | 278 | -10.6%, -33 |
| Number of days |
30 | -3.2%, -1 |
| Average views/day | 9.26 | -7.4%, -0.77 |
October 2009 Blog Report
| Statistic | Value | Change from previous month |
| Number of views | 311 | -67.0%, -631 |
| Number of days |
31 | +3.3%, +1 |
| Average views/day | 10.0 | -213.0%, -21.37 |
| # of Tags (total) |
340 | +13.3%, +40 |
| # of Categories (total) |
17 | 0%, 0 |
| # of Comments (total) |
114 | +6.5%, +7 |
| # of Posts (total) |
69 | 13.1% , +8 |
| Busiest day |
October 8, 20 views | -79.2% ,-76 |
| Most viewed post |
Another example of phony weight loss…, 43 views | -63.2% ,-74 |
| Top referrer | blogsurfer.us/index.php?i=6, 11 views* | -88.8%, -87 |
| Top search term | “apamin weight loss”, 10 views | +25%, +2 |
| Top clicks | deathgleaner.files.wordpress.com/2009… and deathgleaner.files.wordpress.com/2009…, 3 clicks each | -70%, -7 |
| Top-used web browser | Internet Explorer (vv. 7.0 , 5.5 [38 views each]), 121 views total | N/A |
| Top-used OS | Windows (XP with 98 views), 208 views total | N/A |
| Country with most views | United States, 178 views | N/A |
| Top-used OS | Windows (XP with 98 views), 208 views total | N/A |
Statistics are for this month only unless otherwise stated. Asterisk denotes all-time record.
Total blog views since inception: 2403
Notes from the author: Traffic has sunk this month. Only eight blog posts in October. Also note that there are some new statistics, courtesy of GetClicky.com. However, these statistics were compiled November 6th, so they may be very inaccurate.
September 2009 Blog Report
| Statistic | Value | Change from previous month |
| Number of views | 942 | +48.3%, +307 |
| Number of days |
30 | -3.3%, -1 |
| Average views/day | 31.4* | +53.245%, +10.91 |
| # of Tags (total) |
300 | +12.4%, +33 |
| # of Categories (total) |
17 | 0%, 0 |
| # of Comments (total) |
107 | +39%, 30 |
| # of Posts (total) |
61 | 15.1% ,8 |
| Busiest day |
September 27, 96 views | -17.9% ,-21 |
| Most viewed post |
MuseScore: A free music…, 117 views (in September) | -61.5% ,-187 |
| Top referrer | mashable.com/2009/09/26/google-11th-b…, 98 views* | +15.2%, +13 |
| Top search term | “apamin smoothie”, 8 views | +33.3%, +2 |
| Top click | google.com/corporate/timeline/#homepa…, 10 clicks | -37.5%, -6 |
Statistics are for this month only unless otherwise stated. Asterisk denotes all-time record.
Total blog views since inception: 2092
Notes from the author: Another month of top posts! Thanks to all the comment readers at Mashable.com, since those were my biggest traffic income. Also to note that some of these blog statistics may be off plus-or-minus 3 values since the tally was done October 2nd and not October 1st.
August 2009 Blog Report
| Statistic | Value | Change from previous month |
| Number of views | 635 | +96.6%, +312 |
| Number of days |
31 | 0%, 0 |
| Average views/day | 20.49* | +96.6%, +10.42 |
| # of Tags (total) |
267 | — |
| # of Categories (total) |
17 | — |
| # of Comments (total) |
77 | — |
| # of Posts (total) |
53 | — |
| Busiest day |
August 27, 117 views* | N/A |
| Most viewed post |
Why I really hate Wikipedia…, 304 views (in August)* | N/A |
| Top referrer | fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/…, 85 views* | N/A |
| Top search term | “gargbhawna9@gmail.com”, 6 views | N/A |
| Top click | commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mount…, 16 clicks* | N/A |
Statistics are for this month only unless otherwise stated. Asterisk denotes all-time record, N/A = Not applicable, “—” = unavailable.
Total blog views since inception: 1149
Notes from the author: It’s scary how much my blog views jumped this month, all because of the popular post “Why I really hate Wikipedia administrators.” This post generated the most diverse audience my blog has ever seen and the most controversy I had ever had to deal with.
This blog report is also the first one I have done, and it took me over 20 minutes to compile all the data. If you have any suggestions for further blog reports, please leave a comment.
