Progress
Progress
The project started in July 2021 just for fun and as practice. I returned to it from time to time free evenings, and sometimes not touching it for months (the date on the timelapse isn’t very precise, sorry). The current version is marked as v0.4, which roughly reflects the distance to a first final version. I've been working on it full-time for the past few months, which has led to significant progress and gives me hope to finish it this year.
The project started in July 2021 just for fun and as practice. I returned to it from time to time free evenings, and sometimes not touching it for months (the date on the timelapse isn’t very precise, sorry). The current version is marked as v0.4, which roughly reflects the distance to a first final version. I've been working on it full-time for the past few months, which has led to significant progress and gives me hope to finish it this year.
Current status of the layers
Current status of the layers
Persons
------------------
102 ready out of ~300 capacity
Persons
-----------------------
102 ready out of ~300 capacity
Events
------
Only early events, lots of work to do
Events
--------
Only early events, lots of work to do
Highs & Lows
---------------------------------------
Check, add, update, update...
Highs & Lows
--------------------------------------------
Check, add, update, update...
Phases
---------------------------------
Awaiting your feedback and additions
Phases
------------------------------------
Awaiting your feedback and additions
Hacks
-----------------------------------------
Need to revise the categories...
Hacks
-----------------------------------------------
Need to revise the categories...
of Crypto
of Crypto
of Crypto
Whole Story
Whole Story
Whole Story
The
The
The
Timeline
Timeline
Timeline
Grand
Grand
Grand
The
The
The
TL;DR
TL;DR
TL;DR
The Grand Timeline is at the intersection of historical research, storytelling, data visualization, and, due to its size, perhaps art. This massive timeline covers the entire history of Crypto and Web3, starting from the cypherpunks and early cryptography days.
This is a one-man show created by a single designer (hey, I’m Igor @stepahin). There's no company, team or sponsor behind it. The project started three years ago as a side project with no specific goal and turned into something big. It's likely the largest infographic you've ever seen.
The project is now published in a work-in-progress stage to get community feedback, support, determine its future, and make new friends. It's grown big enough to share with you and includes many controversial topics, almost every element and statement can be debated. We have a lot to discuss to make the information balanced and objective.
This page isn't the project itself but a showcase about it. The project lives as a Figma file, and from now on, I'll continue working on it publicly. It's a kind of "open source design." Now you can follow updates in real-time and comment on them.
The Grand Timeline is at the intersection of historical research, storytelling, data visualization, and, due to its size, perhaps art. This massive timeline covers the entire history of Crypto and Web3, starting from the cypherpunks and early cryptography days.
This is a one-man show created by a single designer (hey, I’m Igor @stepahin). There's no company, team or sponsor behind it. The project started three years ago as a side project with no specific goal and turned into something big. It's likely the largest infographic you've ever seen.
The project is now published in a work-in-progress stage to get community feedback, support, determine its future, and make new friends. It's grown big enough to share with you and includes many controversial topics, almost every element and statement can be debated. We have a lot to discuss to make the information balanced and objective.
This page isn't the project itself but a showcase about it. The project lives as a Figma file, and from now on, I'll continue working on it publicly. It's a kind of "open source design." Now you can follow updates in real-time and comment on them.
The Grand Timeline is at the intersection of historical research, storytelling, data visualization, and, due to its size, perhaps art. This massive timeline covers the entire history of Crypto and Web3, starting from the cypherpunks and early cryptography days.
This is a one-man show created by a single designer (hey, I’m Igor @stepahin). There's no company, team or sponsor behind it. The project started three years ago as a side project with no specific goal and turned into something big. It's likely the largest infographic you've ever seen.
The project is now published in a work-in-progress stage to get community feedback, support, determine its future, and make new friends. It's grown big enough to share with you and includes many controversial topics, almost every element and statement can be debated. We have a lot to discuss to make the information balanced and objective.
This page isn't the project itself but a showcase about it. The project lives as a Figma file, and from now on, I'll continue working on it publicly. It's a kind of "open source design." Now you can follow updates in real-time and comment on them.
Events on the timeline are probably the largest and most detailed layer. However, at the moment, it is also the most underdeveloped and empty layer. Currently, there are over 200 events, mainly early ones and mostly about Bitcoin. In the future, I’ll try to cover all areas. There's no special priority for Bitcoin — it just happened to start everything.
When selecting events, I follow three principles, and an event must meet at least one of them: 1) significance to the market; 2) an unbroken chain of events to tell a complete story; 3) something particularly interesting. The timeline has a total capacity, and each element has a fixed font size, so there's a lot of work ahead to set the right priorities. There are far more interesting stories and events than the canvas can accommodate.
People are the main force driving the industry forward. Many remarkable and brilliant individuals have made all of this a reality. There are also bad actors who have made the community and products stronger. I tried to select the most significant figures from my subjective viewpoint, prioritizing creators over investors and engineers over entrepreneurs, but I aimed to represent all roles and fields. Currently, the canvas can fit around 300 people, and I’ll probably revisit the list many times with your help.
Where did these portraits come from? You can probably guess, but let's talk about it in detail below. In the initial version, I just used different styles and quality photos from the internet, which was the bad and weak part that prevented me from publishing the project. Now, everything has changed...
The timeline features price charts for Bitcoin and Ethereum, the main market indicators. I've marked all price highs and lows so you can correlate them with events, which also aligns with the Bull and Bear markets in the Phases layer (though boundaries are debatable). Peaks of The Flippening index are also shown, and more interesting metrics around market cap will be added.
Important, Bitcoin and Ethereum are shown on a relative scale to simplify, as their prices differ by ~18 times, making it impossible to display both charts in detail on an absolute scale. Also early large fluctuations in Bitcoin's price, like before $1,000, are almost invisible due to the scale, despite their market impact (I avoided a logarithmic chart since it's hard to read on such a wide chart without a detailed Y-axis and horizontal grid).
These colorful sausages represent various phases in crypto history. The first two shows Bull and Bear markets, though their boundaries are debatable, I've placed them at price peaks. Interestingly, I couldn’t find anyone who has tried to count and number all Bull and Bear markets.
So, I started the phases from the earliest stage. First were the Cypherpunks, then Satoshi Nakamoto Activity, Early Bitcoin, and the 1st Bull Run. I also marked all the booms when everyone went crazy over something in crypto (and then forgot about it), like ICOs, NFTs, Move To Earn, and Play To Earn. I'm sure I've missed a lot, but that's why I need community feedback.
These markers are quite long, so I designed the typography inside like a wrapping tape, ensuring you can see the names and dates at any point.
This whole project actually started with a small infographic about the biggest hacks, created over four years ago. Expanding it led me into a rabbit hole...
I manually reworked several reports, researches, articles, added my own data, and fixed inaccuracies. The categories are currently simplified to: regular hacks, smart-contract hacks, scams, and white hacks. I might add more detailed categories and the biggest crypto losses due to stupidity later.
The magic of this part is that GPT-4 helped me code the data visualization using D3.js (remember, I’m a designer, not an engineer). The result is a hybrid bubble chart and swarm plot, where circle size represents the amount, the X position is the exact date, and the Y position allows the circles to freely spread out due to force simulation within the chart's height.
People
Events
Highs & Lows
Phases
Hacks
Layers
In case this is your first time seeing the Figma:
Sign Up to Leave Comments on the canvas. Press C or the comment icon at the top left. I'll periodically resolve comments (archive, hide), but they'll still be available in the Comment mode sidebar -> Show resolved comments.
Sign Up to Leave Comments on the canvas. Press C or the comment icon at the top left. I'll periodically resolve comments (archive, hide), but they'll still be available in the Comment mode sidebar -> Show resolved comments.
Than Hide Comments if there are too many cluttering the view, you can hide them with ⇧Shift+C or from the View Options menu (25% ▾) at the top right.
Than Hide Comments if there are too many cluttering the view, you can hide them with ⇧Shift+C or from the View Options menu (25% ▾) at the top right.
Hide Cursors on a busy day like in the Louvre, you might be distracted by a swarm of cursors. Hide them by disabling Multiplayer cursors with ⌥+⌘+\ or Alt+Ctrl+\ or from the menu on the top right.
Hide Cursors on a busy day like in the Louvre, you might be distracted by a swarm of cursors. Hide them by disabling Multiplayer cursors with ⌥+⌘+\ or Alt+Ctrl+\ or from the menu on the top right.
Or Send Messages with Cursor Chat if you don't disable cursors, you can chat with disappearing messages. Just press / and type. Press Esc to exit this mode.
Or Send Messages with Cursor Chat if you don't disable cursors, you can chat with disappearing messages. Just press / and type. Press Esc to exit this mode.
Now you're a fully prepped Figma viewer. I hope your computer is less than 5 yo old because the file is pretty heavy. If not, please let it render this.
Mission Why?
Mission Why?
Mission Why?
I'm doing this because I'm incredibly fascinated by how unique and interesting the crypto community is, and the amazing stories happening within it. I want to share and tell these stories. There's truly nothing else like this community around any other technology or field in the world. So, I want to show this beautiful and interesting side to as many people as possible, to attract more wonderful and smart individuals to the crypto space.
I'm doing this because I'm incredibly fascinated by how unique and interesting the crypto community is, and the amazing stories happening within it. I want to share and tell these stories. There's truly nothing else like this community around any other technology or field in the world. So, I want to show this beautiful and interesting side to as many people as possible, to attract more wonderful and smart individuals to the crypto space.
I'm doing this because I'm incredibly fascinated by how unique and interesting the crypto community is, and the amazing stories happening within it. I want to share and tell these stories. There's truly nothing else like this community around any other technology or field in the world. So, I want to show this beautiful and interesting side to as many people as possible, to attract more wonderful and smart individuals to the crypto space.
Portraits
Portraits
A Project
within a Project
A Project
within a Project
I was very frustrated that I had to use crappy photos from the internet for person cards. Different styles, poor quality, low resolution, completely different compositions, messy backgrounds, bw and color, old and new photos. Or another situation where the portraits are perfect, like Vitalik by FORTUNE or CZ by Forbes, but I don't have the rights to use those photos. But what were the options?
Real photoshoots? Photographing all these people was impossible — not just because of the zero budget, but also because some of them are no longer with us, some have aged significantly but appear on the timeline from 30 years ago, some are in prison, some are very private persons and would never agree to participate (after all, I’m not Time magazine), and some are just incredibly busy…
Illustrations? Like Cointelegraph or Forbes. I'm not an illustrator, and hiring one for 100-300 portraits sounds absurd and incredibly expensive for a personal side project and time-consuming with zero wow factor.
Maybe Photoshop retouch and filters? Many media do this when they need a series of portraits, but honestly, I've never seen it look very good. It wouldn’t add any uniqueness or value to the project.
Neural Networks? Okay, now we're talking. In 2021, there was almost nothing useful — just the Prisma app with its filters and some experiments with various StyleGANs, but all of it was pretty weak. In 2022, things got better with DreamBooth for Stable Diffusion, but it was still not good enough, stable, or fast. In 2023, LoRA for SD 1.5 came out, followed by SDXL and later IPAdapter. That's when I built a PC with a 4090 and kept watching the releases. By 2024, more tools and information became available, and I realized IT WAS TIME.
I was very frustrated that I had to use crappy photos from the internet for person cards. Different styles, poor quality, low resolution, completely different compositions, messy backgrounds, bw and color, old and new photos. Or another situation where the portraits are perfect, like Vitalik by FORTUNE or CZ by Forbes, but I don't have the rights to use those photos. But what were the options?
Real photoshoots? Photographing all these people was impossible — not just because of the zero budget, but also because some of them are no longer with us, some have aged significantly but appear on the timeline from 30 years ago, some are in prison, some are very private persons and would never agree to participate (after all, I’m not Time magazine), and some are just incredibly busy…
Illustrations? Like Cointelegraph or Forbes. I'm not an illustrator, and hiring one for 100-300 portraits sounds absurd and incredibly expensive for a personal side project and time-consuming with zero wow factor.
Maybe Photoshop retouch and filters? Many media do this when they need a series of portraits, but honestly, I've never seen it look very good. It wouldn’t add any uniqueness or value to the project.
Neural Networks? Okay, now we're talking. In 2021, there was almost nothing useful — just the Prisma app with its filters and some experiments with various StyleGANs, but all of it was pretty weak. In 2022, things got better with DreamBooth for Stable Diffusion, but it was still not good enough, stable, or fast. In 2023, LoRA for SD 1.5 came out, followed by SDXL and later IPAdapter. That's when I built a PC with a 4090 and kept watching the releases. By 2024, more tools and information became available, and I realized IT WAS TIME.
I was very frustrated that I had to use crappy photos from the internet for person cards. Different styles, poor quality, low resolution, completely different compositions, messy backgrounds, bw and color, old and new photos. Or another situation where the portraits are perfect, like Vitalik by FORTUNE or CZ by Forbes, but I don't have the rights to use those photos. But what were the options?
Real photoshoots? Photographing all these people was impossible — not just because of the zero budget, but also because some of them are no longer with us, some have aged significantly but appear on the timeline from 30 years ago, some are in prison, some are very private persons and would never agree to participate (after all, I’m not Time magazine), and some are just incredibly busy…
Illustrations? Like Cointelegraph or Forbes. I'm not an illustrator, and hiring one for 100-300 portraits sounds absurd and incredibly expensive for a personal side project and time-consuming with zero wow factor.
Maybe Photoshop retouch and filters? Many media do this when they need a series of portraits, but honestly, I've never seen it look very good. It wouldn’t add any uniqueness or value to the project.
Neural Networks? Okay, now we're talking. In 2021, there was almost nothing useful — just the Prisma app with its filters and some experiments with various StyleGANs, but all of it was pretty weak. In 2022, things got better with DreamBooth for Stable Diffusion, but it was still not good enough, stable, or fast. In 2023, LoRA for SD 1.5 came out, followed by SDXL and later IPAdapter. That's when I built a PC with a 4090 and kept watching the releases. By 2024, more tools and information became available, and I realized IT WAS TIME.
No one had ever done it this way before
No one had ever done it this way before
I trained my own LoRA model for portrait styles, inspired by the best photographers who shoot for Esquire, Time, Fortune, Wired, Forbes, Bloomberg, and GQ. So I got 10+ photo styles (lighting, lens, depth of field, retouching and color grading). Then I set up background randomization for each style, and randomized clothing for each person based on what they typically wear in real photos (hello Pavel, hello Casey!). IPAdapter and LoRA ensure the likeness.
It took me about a month to learn SD and ComfyUI and another month to generate 102 portraits. Interestingly, the best results came not from "tuning settings for a long time and generating a few perfect images," but rather from "quickly setting up and generating a ton of images to get one perfect." I would generate around 500-1500 Vitaliks to get one best shot. I called this process "Likeness Mining."
Then came the first selection stage with automatic sorting based on likeness factor to the real photo (thanks to dlib), where I chose 20-100 out of thousands. The second selection stage narrowed it down to the 5-20 portraits per person. Finally, I had to pick the one "perfect photo", ensuring the overall collection was diverse in colors and styles. The good shot would then go through inpainting for problem details, outpainting for the lower part of the portrait, and a final upscale.
The plan was to create 20-40 portraits as a teaser for the project, but I got so carried away that I stopped at 102, including one dog and three anonymous figures with hidden faces.
I trained my own LoRA model for portrait styles, inspired by the best photographers who shoot for Esquire, Time, Fortune, Wired, Forbes, Bloomberg, and GQ. So I got 10+ photo styles (lighting, lens, depth of field, retouching and color grading). Then I set up background randomization for each style, and randomized clothing for each person based on what they typically wear in real photos (hello Pavel, hello Casey!). IPAdapter and LoRA ensure the likeness.
It took me about a month to learn SD and ComfyUI and another month to generate 102 portraits. Interestingly, the best results came not from "tuning settings for a long time and generating a few perfect images," but rather from "quickly setting up and generating a ton of images to get one perfect." I would generate around 500-1500 Vitaliks to get one best shot. I called this process "Likeness Mining."
Then came the first selection stage with automatic sorting based on likeness factor to the real photo (thanks to dlib), where I chose 20-100 out of thousands. The second selection stage narrowed it down to the 5-20 portraits per person. Finally, I had to pick the one "perfect photo", ensuring the overall collection was diverse in colors and styles. The good shot would then go through inpainting for problem details, outpainting for the lower part of the portrait, and a final upscale.
The plan was to create 20-40 portraits as a teaser for the project, but I got so carried away that I stopped at 102, including one dog and three anonymous figures with hidden faces.
I trained my own LoRA model for portrait styles, inspired by the best photographers who shoot for Esquire, Time, Fortune, Wired, Forbes, Bloomberg, and GQ. So I got 10+ photo styles (lighting, lens, depth of field, retouching and color grading). Then I set up background randomization for each style, and randomized clothing for each person based on what they typically wear in real photos (hello Pavel, hello Casey!). IPAdapter and LoRA ensure the likeness.
It took me about a month to learn SD and ComfyUI and another month to generate 102 portraits. Interestingly, the best results came not from "tuning settings for a long time and generating a few perfect images," but rather from "quickly setting up and generating a ton of images to get one perfect." I would generate around 500-1500 Vitaliks to get one best shot. I called this process "Likeness Mining."
Then came the first selection stage with automatic sorting based on likeness factor to the real photo (thanks to dlib), where I chose 20-100 out of thousands. The second selection stage narrowed it down to the 5-20 portraits per person. Finally, I had to pick the one "perfect photo", ensuring the overall collection was diverse in colors and styles. The good shot would then go through inpainting for problem details, outpainting for the lower part of the portrait, and a final upscale.
The plan was to create 20-40 portraits as a teaser for the project, but I got so carried away that I stopped at 102, including one dog and three anonymous figures with hidden faces.
Fun fact: The creator of the best upscaler, SUPIR, which I used, is Stephan Tual, the former CCO of Ethereum from the earliest founding team. He later left the crypto community to focus on AI, ML, and Deep Learning stuff.
There were 134,000
generations made to select
102 final portraits
There were 134,000
generations made to select
102 final portraits
There were 134,000
generations made to select
102 final portraits
* Just to clarify, the images don't show real people — they're products of my imagination and a creative interpretation. Let's say this is the most accurate biopic cast you'll ever see!
* Just to clarify, the images don't show real people — they're products of my imagination and a creative interpretation. Let's say this is the most accurate biopic cast you'll ever see!
Jack Mallers
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
David Chaum
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
John Gilmore
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
John McAfee
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Timothy C. May
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Vitalik Buterin
Vitalik Buterin, the lead co-founder of Ethereum, is transforming the blockchain world. At just 19, he launched Ethereum, enabling smart contracts and decentralized apps.
@VitalikButerin
Viktor Radchenko
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Scott Stornetta
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Eric Hughes
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sam Bankman-Fried
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Phil Zimmermann
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Hal Finney
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Mike Novogratz
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Wei Dai
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Jordan Fish
Jordan Fish, aka Cobie, started as an anonymous Twitter account and now has over 700K followers. As the co-founder of Lido, he’s a major figure in crypto and DeFi. His insights and influence have shaped the web3 landscape.
@cobie
Alex Gluchowski
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Bram Cohen
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gary Gensler
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Pavel Durov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Julian Assange
Cypherpunk, programmer, hacker, editor, publisher, and activist, founded WikiLeaks in 2006. Forced to accept Bitcoin donations, possibly prompting Satoshi's disappearance. Imprisoned in London since 2019, fighting US extradition.
Plan B
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Devin Finzer
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Nick Szabo
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Alexey Pertsev
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sebastien Borget
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Laszlo Hanyecz
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Michael Egorov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Andre Cronje
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gavin Andresen
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Casey Rodarmor
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Joseph Lubin
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Emin Gün Sirer
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Ralph Merkle
Pioneer in cryptography, co-inventor of public-key cryptography, developer of Merkle trees, crucial for blockchain. Now a researcher and speaker on cryonics.
Anton Bukov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Satoshi Nakomoto
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Pacman Tieshun Roquerre
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Nayib Bukele
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Marek Palatinus
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Anthony Pompliano
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sreeram Kannan
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Mike Hearn
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Hayden Adams
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Kain Warwick
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gloria Zhao
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Ross Ulbricht
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Konstantin Lomashuk
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Jeff Garzik
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gavin Wood
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Zooko Wilcox
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Willy Woo
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Stani Kulechov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sandeep Nailwal
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Stuart Haber
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Arthur Hayes
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Elon Musk
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Adam Back
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Elizabeth Stark
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Roman Storm
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Martti Malmi
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Michael Saylor
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Dylan Field
Dylan Field, CEO of Figma, the only graphic editor capable of creating The Grand Timeline, is a prominent web3 enthusiast. In 2018, he bought CryptoPunk #7804 and sold it for a record-breaking $7.5M at the start of the NFT boom, making headlines.
@zoink
Mark Karpelès
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Anatoly Yakovenko
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Wanna share some portraits?
Mega thread with all of them
* Just to clarify, the images don't show real people — they're products of my imagination and a creative interpretation. Let's say this is the most accurate biopic cast you'll ever see!
Jack Mallers
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
David Chaum
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
John Gilmore
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
John McAfee
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Timothy C. May
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Vitalik Buterin
Vitalik Buterin, the lead co-founder of Ethereum, is transforming the blockchain world. At just 19, he launched Ethereum, enabling smart contracts and decentralized apps.
@VitalikButerin
Viktor Radchenko
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Scott Stornetta
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Eric Hughes
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sam Bankman-Fried
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Phil Zimmermann
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Hal Finney
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Mike Novogratz
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Wei Dai
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Jordan Fish
Jordan Fish, aka Cobie, started as an anonymous Twitter account and now has over 700K followers. As the co-founder of Lido, he’s a major figure in crypto and DeFi. His insights and influence have shaped the web3 landscape.
@cobie
Alex Gluchowski
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Bram Cohen
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gary Gensler
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Pavel Durov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Julian Assange
Cypherpunk, programmer, hacker, editor, publisher, and activist, founded WikiLeaks in 2006. Forced to accept Bitcoin donations, possibly prompting Satoshi's disappearance. Imprisoned in London since 2019, fighting US extradition.
Plan B
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Devin Finzer
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Nick Szabo
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Alexey Pertsev
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sebastien Borget
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Laszlo Hanyecz
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Michael Egorov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Andre Cronje
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gavin Andresen
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Casey Rodarmor
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Joseph Lubin
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Emin Gün Sirer
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Ralph Merkle
Pioneer in cryptography, co-inventor of public-key cryptography, developer of Merkle trees, crucial for blockchain. Now a researcher and speaker on cryonics.
Anton Bukov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Satoshi Nakomoto
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Pacman Tieshun Roquerre
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Nayib Bukele
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Marek Palatinus
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Anthony Pompliano
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sreeram Kannan
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Mike Hearn
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Hayden Adams
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Kain Warwick
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gloria Zhao
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Ross Ulbricht
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Konstantin Lomashuk
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Jeff Garzik
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Gavin Wood
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Zooko Wilcox
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Willy Woo
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Stani Kulechov
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Sandeep Nailwal
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Stuart Haber
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Arthur Hayes
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Elon Musk
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Adam Back
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Elizabeth Stark
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Roman Storm
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Martti Malmi
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Michael Saylor
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Dylan Field
Dylan Field, CEO of Figma, the only graphic editor capable of creating The Grand Timeline, is a prominent web3 enthusiast. In 2018, he bought CryptoPunk #7804 and sold it for a record-breaking $7.5M at the start of the NFT boom, making headlines.
@zoink
Mark Karpelès
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Anatoly Yakovenko
Short bio of this fantastic human coming soon, be patience folks. None of the text on nearby cards is final until you see 'v.1' in the corner of Timeline.
Wanna share some portraits?
Mega thread with all of them
It's safe to say that no one has done this before, at least not publicly, combining all these factors that multiply the complexity of generation:
Real people + high likeness
Living now people: This is a crucial psychological factor. The last thing I wanted was to offend someone by creating a "caricature" instead of a good portrait. It's much harder than generating someone from the 18th century.
No art stylization: Stylization allows our eyes to forgive mistakes and low likeness; photography does not. We immediately notice any discrepancies.
Style, quality, and details: The portraits shouldn't feel like they were generated by neural network (don't zoom in, okay?)
A large volume of 100+ portraits
Workflow stability: I didn’t back down from any "difficult" faces
Production speed: no time to spend a week on portrait; I managed 3-5/day
This way, I was able to create perfect and diverse portraits of people at the age they were when they made history on the Timeline. It's breathtaking to achieve such high-quality portraits of people who are no longer with us, those in prison, those who lead very private lives and wouldn't agree to a photoshoot, those who are already very old, and those who are simply too busy and high-profile for something less than Time/Forbes/Fortune... This simply wasn't possible until now!
It's safe to say that no one has done this before, at least not publicly, combining all these factors that multiply the complexity of generation:
Real people + high likeness
Living now people: This is a crucial psychological factor. The last thing I wanted was to offend someone by creating a "caricature" instead of a good portrait. It's much harder than generating someone from the 18th century.
No art stylization: Stylization allows our eyes to forgive mistakes and low likeness; photography does not. We immediately notice any discrepancies.
Style, quality, and details: The portraits shouldn't feel like they were generated by neural network (don't zoom in, okay?)
A large volume of 100+ portraits
Workflow stability: I didn’t back down from any "difficult" faces
Production speed: no time to spend a week on portrait; I managed 3-5/day
This way, I was able to create perfect and diverse portraits of people at the age they were when they made history on the Timeline. It's breathtaking to achieve such high-quality portraits of people who are no longer with us, those in prison, those who lead very private lives and wouldn't agree to a photoshoot, those who are already very old, and those who are simply too busy and high-profile for something less than Time/Forbes/Fortune... This simply wasn't possible until now!
It's safe to say that no one has done this before, at least not publicly, combining all these factors that multiply the complexity of generation:
Real people + high likeness
Living now people: This is a crucial psychological factor. The last thing I wanted was to offend someone by creating a "caricature" instead of a good portrait. It's much harder than generating someone from the 18th century.
No art stylization: Stylization allows our eyes to forgive mistakes and low likeness; photography does not. We immediately notice any discrepancies.
Style, quality, and details: The portraits shouldn't feel like they were generated by neural network (don't zoom in, okay?)
A large volume of 100+ portraits
Workflow stability: I didn’t back down from any "difficult" faces
Production speed: no time to spend a week on portrait; I managed 3-5/day
This way, I was able to create perfect and diverse portraits of people at the age they were when they made history on the Timeline. It's breathtaking to achieve such high-quality portraits of people who are no longer with us, those in prison, those who lead very private lives and wouldn't agree to a photoshoot, those who are already very old, and those who are simply too busy and high-profile for something less than Time/Forbes/Fortune... This simply wasn't possible until now!
—
An interesting thing is that people try to solve similar tasks using "consumer" neural networks that don't require serious skills, complex software and their own GPU resources. This is, of course, impossible at the moment. If you search for Vitalik Buterin on Google Images, you'll see many portraits that don't resemble Vitalik at all, made in MidJourney, and they look terrible. Don't do that.
*
* Just to clarify, the images don't show real people — they're products of my imagination and a creative interpretation. Let's say this is the most accurate biopic cast you'll ever see!
Wanna share
some portraits?
Wanna share
some portraits?
Mega thread with all of them
The Plan
& Final Format
The Plan
& Final Format
The Plan
& Final Format
This project is a big experiment, and it’s pretty bold and naive to make concrete plans for its future. Still, without any specific plan, it has reached the state you see now. That’s something! I believe it’s worth continuing in the same spirit, and it will lead to an final release. So now I'm publishing the project to gather feedback and, hopefully, get some support. Here's a brief overview of what’s next IF...
This project is a big experiment, and it’s pretty bold and naive to make concrete plans for its future. Still, without any specific plan, it has reached the state you see now. That’s something! I believe it’s worth continuing in the same spirit, and it will lead to an final release. So now I'm publishing the project to gather feedback and, hopefully, get some support. Here's a brief overview of what’s next IF...
This project is a big experiment, and it’s pretty bold and naive to make concrete plans for its future. Still, without any specific plan, it has reached the state you see now. That’s something! I believe it’s worth continuing in the same spirit, and it will lead to an final release. So now I'm publishing the project to gather feedback and, hopefully, get some support. Here's a brief overview of what’s next IF...
Almost No Support. Cold feedback and low interest → I’ll continue at the same pace, working on the project occasionally, but I’ll definitely finish it someday. It will remain a Figma file and a static poster; some lucky folks might get a printed version. Please, hire me for my dream job so I can pay rent this month (seriously, not kidding).
Almost No Support. Cold feedback and low interest → I’ll continue at the same pace, working on the project occasionally, but I’ll definitely finish it someday. It will remain a Figma file and a static poster; some lucky folks might get a printed version. Please, hire me for my dream job so I can pay rent this month (seriously, not kidding).
Almost No Support. Cold feedback and low interest → I’ll continue at the same pace, working on the project occasionally, but I’ll definitely finish it someday. It will remain a Figma file and a static poster; some lucky folks might get a printed version. Please, hire me for my dream job so I can pay rent this month (seriously, not kidding).
Moderate Support. Good feedback and significant interest → I’ll be able to cover my bills and focus on the project part-time or even full-time. I’ll move faster and aim to finish v1.0 this year, with printed versions ready by the new year (I hope!). It will still be a static Figma poster with clickable links and a printed version.
Moderate Support. Good feedback and significant interest → I’ll be able to cover my bills and focus on the project part-time or even full-time. I’ll move faster and aim to finish v1.0 this year, with printed versions ready by the new year (I hope!). It will still be a static Figma poster with clickable links and a printed version.
Moderate Support. Good feedback and significant interest → I’ll be able to cover my bills and focus on the project part-time or even full-time. I’ll move faster and aim to finish v1.0 this year, with printed versions ready by the new year (I hope!). It will still be a static Figma poster with clickable links and a printed version.
Sold Out! If there’s excitement, retweets, a lot of feedback, research help, and generous funding → I can fully focus on the project. This will not only ensure a high-quality final version this year (fingers crossed!) but also allow me to hire a small team to create an interactive version with navigation and cool features.
Sold Out! If there’s excitement, retweets, a lot of feedback, research help, and generous funding → I can fully focus on the project. This will not only ensure a high-quality final version this year (fingers crossed!) but also allow me to hire a small team to create an interactive version with navigation and cool features.
Sold Out! If there’s excitement, retweets, a lot of feedback, research help, and generous funding → I can fully focus on the project. This will not only ensure a high-quality final version this year (fingers crossed!) but also allow me to hire a small team to create an interactive version with navigation and cool features.
Support
the project
Support
the project
Support
the project
A lot has already been done, but the project demands a tremendous amount of time and focus to reach its final release. This is your chance to help and literally become a part of a grand history. Here’s how you can do it.
A lot has already been done, but the project demands a tremendous amount of time and focus to reach its final release. This is your chance to help and literally become a part of a grand history. Here’s how you can do it.
A lot has already been done, but the project demands a tremendous amount of time and focus to reach its final release. This is your chance to help and literally become a part of a grand history. Here’s how you can do it.
Follow, Share, Retweet
Follow, Share, Retweet
It costs you nothing and takes just seconds. Follow @grandtimeline and me @stepahin. Share the link to this page and the threads somewhere:
Project overview Portraits mega-thread How It Was Done Hack & Scam Chart
It costs you nothing and takes just seconds. Follow @grandtimeline and me @stepahin. Share the link to this page and the threads somewhere:
Project overview Portraits mega-thread How It Was Done Hack & Scam Chart
It costs you nothing and takes just seconds. Follow @grandtimeline and me @stepahin. Share the link to this page and the threads somewhere:
Project overview Portraits mega-thread How It Was Done Hack & Scam Chart
Vote on Artizen
Vote on Artizen
Sign up and vote to increase its chances of getting a grant from the Artizen Fund. Know of other orgs, funds or DAOs that might support the project? Let me know!
Sign up and vote to increase its chances of getting a grant from the Artizen Fund. Know of other orgs, funds or DAOs that might support the project? Let me know!
Sign up and vote to increase its chances of getting a grant from the Artizen Fund. Know of other orgs, funds or DAOs that might support the project? Let me know!
Review the Content
Review the Content
Digging deep into history, I aim for accuracy, but no doubt some details slip. Spot an error? Sign up on Figma and use the 💬 Comment tool to let me know – your insight is golden! Ideas and thoughts are welcome there, too.
Digging deep into history, I aim for accuracy, but no doubt some details slip. Spot an error? Sign up on Figma and use the 💬 Comment tool to let me know – your insight is golden! Ideas and thoughts are welcome there, too.
Digging deep into history, I aim for accuracy, but no doubt some details slip. Spot an error? Sign up on Figma and use the 💬 Comment tool to let me know – your insight is golden! Ideas and thoughts are welcome there, too.
Be a Hero — Fund the Project! Please
Be a Hero — Fund the Project! Please
Right now, it's just me behind this project, and I really need your support to move forward and investing my time. It takes a lot! You can donate crypto in any way that works for you and get something back. Do it now!
Right now, it's just me behind this project, and I really need your support to move forward and investing my time. It takes a lot! You can donate crypto in any way that works for you and get something back. Do it now!
Right now, it's just me behind this project, and I really need your support to move forward and investing my time. It takes a lot! You can donate crypto in any way that works for you and get something back. Do it now!
Events on the timeline are probably the largest and most detailed layer. However, at the moment, it is also the most underdeveloped and empty layer. Currently, there are over 200 events, mainly early ones and mostly about Bitcoin. In the future, I’ll try to cover all areas. There's no special priority for Bitcoin — it just happened to start everything.
When selecting events, I follow three principles, and an event must meet at least one of them: 1) significance to the market; 2) an unbroken chain of events to tell a complete story; 3) something particularly interesting. The timeline has a total capacity, and each element has a fixed font size, so there's a lot of work ahead to set the right priorities. There are far more interesting stories and events than the canvas can accommodate.
People are the main force driving the industry forward. Many remarkable and brilliant individuals have made all of this a reality. There are also bad actors who have made the community and products stronger. I tried to select the most significant figures from my subjective viewpoint, prioritizing creators over investors and engineers over entrepreneurs, but I aimed to represent all roles and fields. Currently, the canvas can fit around 300 people, and I’ll probably revisit the list many times with your help.
Where did these portraits come from? You can probably guess, but let's talk about it in detail below. In the initial version, I just used different styles and quality photos from the internet, which was the bad and weak part that prevented me from publishing the project. Now, everything has changed...
The timeline features price charts for Bitcoin and Ethereum, the main market indicators. I've marked all price highs and lows so you can correlate them with events, which also aligns with the Bull and Bear markets in the Phases layer (though boundaries are debatable). Peaks of The Flippening index are also shown, and more interesting metrics around market cap will be added.
Important, Bitcoin and Ethereum are shown on a relative scale to simplify, as their prices differ by ~18 times, making it impossible to display both charts in detail on an absolute scale. Also early large fluctuations in Bitcoin's price, like before $1,000, are almost invisible due to the scale, despite their market impact (I avoided a logarithmic chart since it's hard to read on such a wide chart without a detailed Y-axis and horizontal grid).
These colorful sausages represent various phases in crypto history. The first two shows Bull and Bear markets, though their boundaries are debatable, I've placed them at price peaks. Interestingly, I couldn’t find anyone who has tried to count and number all Bull and Bear markets.
So, I started the phases from the earliest stage. First were the Cypherpunks, then Satoshi Nakamoto Activity, Early Bitcoin, and the 1st Bull Run. I also marked all the booms when everyone went crazy over something in crypto (and then forgot about it), like ICOs, NFTs, Move To Earn, and Play To Earn. I'm sure I've missed a lot, but that's why I need community feedback.
These markers are quite long, so I designed the typography inside like a wrapping tape, ensuring you can see the names and dates at any point.
This whole project actually started with a small infographic about the biggest hacks, created over four years ago. Expanding it led me into a rabbit hole...
I manually reworked several reports, researches, articles, added my own data, and fixed inaccuracies. The categories are currently simplified to: regular hacks, smart-contract hacks, scams, and white hacks. I might add more detailed categories and the biggest crypto losses due to stupidity later.
The magic of this part is that GPT-4 helped me code the data visualization using D3.js (remember, I’m a designer, not an engineer). The result is a hybrid bubble chart and swarm plot, where circle size represents the amount, the X position is the exact date, and the Y position allows the circles to freely spread out due to force simulation within the chart's height.
People
Events
Highs & Lows
Phases
Hacks
Layers
People
People are the main force driving the industry forward. Many remarkable and brilliant individuals have made all of this a reality. There are also bad actors who have made the community and products stronger. I tried to select the most significant figures from my subjective viewpoint, prioritizing creators over investors and engineers over entrepreneurs, but I aimed to represent all roles and fields. Currently, the canvas can fit around 300 people, and I’ll probably revisit the list many times with your help.
Where did these portraits come from? You can probably guess, but let's talk about it in detail below. In the initial version, I just used different styles and quality photos from the internet, which was the bad and weak part that prevented me from publishing the project. Now, everything has changed...
Events
Events on the timeline are probably the largest and most detailed layer. However, at the moment, it is also the most underdeveloped and empty layer. Currently, there are over 200 events, mainly early ones and mostly about Bitcoin. In the future, I’ll try to cover all areas. There's no special priority for Bitcoin — it just happened to start everything.
When selecting events, I follow three principles, and an event must meet at least one of them: 1) significance to the market; 2) an unbroken chain of events to tell a complete story; 3) something particularly interesting. The timeline has a total capacity, and each element has a fixed font size, so there's a lot of work ahead to set the right priorities. There are far more interesting stories and events than the canvas can accommodate.
Highs & Lows
The timeline features price charts for Bitcoin and Ethereum, the main market indicators. I've marked all price highs and lows so you can correlate them with events, which also aligns with the Bull and Bear markets in the Phases layer (though boundaries are debatable). Peaks of The Flippening index are also shown, and more interesting metrics around market cap will be added.
Important, Bitcoin and Ethereum are shown on a relative scale to simplify, as their prices differ by ~18 times, making it impossible to display both charts in detail on an absolute scale. Also early large fluctuations in Bitcoin's price, like before $1,000, are almost invisible due to the scale, despite their market impact (I avoided a logarithmic chart since it's hard to read on such a wide chart without a detailed Y-axis and horizontal grid).
Phases
These colorful sausages represent various phases in crypto history. The first two shows Bull and Bear markets, though their boundaries are debatable, I've placed them at price peaks. Interestingly, I couldn’t find anyone who has tried to count and number all Bull and Bear markets.
So, I started the phases from the earliest stage. First were the Cypherpunks, then Satoshi Nakamoto Activity, Early Bitcoin, and the 1st Bull Run. I also marked all the booms when everyone went crazy over something in crypto (and then forgot about it), like ICOs, NFTs, Move To Earn, and Play To Earn. I'm sure I've missed a lot, but that's why I need community feedback.
These markers are quite long, so I designed the typography inside like a wrapping tape, ensuring you can see the names and dates at any point.
Hacks
This whole project actually started with a small infographic about the biggest hacks, created over four years ago. Expanding it led me into a rabbit hole...
I manually reworked several reports, researches, articles, added my own data, and fixed inaccuracies. The categories are currently simplified to: regular hacks, smart-contract hacks, scams, and white hacks. I might add more detailed categories and the biggest crypto losses due to stupidity later.
The magic of this part is that GPT-4 helped me code the data visualization using D3.js (remember, I’m a designer, not an engineer). The result is a hybrid bubble chart and swarm plot, where circle size represents the amount, the X position is the exact date, and the Y position allows the circles to freely spread out due to force simulation within the chart's height.
Progress
The project started in July 2021 just for fun and as practice. I returned to it from time to time free evenings, and sometimes not touching it for months (the date on the timelapse isn’t very precise, sorry). The current version is marked as v0.4, which roughly reflects the distance to a first final version. I've been working on it full-time for the past few months, which has led to significant progress and gives me hope to finish it this year.
Current status of the layers
Persons
--------------------------
102 ready out of ~300 capacity
Persons
--------------------------
102 ready out of ~300 capacity
Events
------------
Only early events, lots of work to do
Events
------------
Only early events, lots of work to do
Highs & Lows
-----------------------------------------------------------
Check, add, update, update...
Highs & Lows
-----------------------------------------------------------
Check, add, update, update...
Phases
------------------------------------------------
Awaiting your feedback and additions
Phases
------------------------------------------------
Awaiting your feedback and additions
Hacks
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Need to revise the categories...
Hacks
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Need to revise the categories...
Portraits
A Project
within a Project