I'm doing the 100 Days of Solana challenge by MLH, and Week 2 just changed how I think about blockchain data entirely. Week 1 was about identity — generating keypairs, understanding wallets, getting devnet SOL. That part felt familiar, like setting up a dev environment. Week 2 was different. Week 2 was about reading the chain — and that's where the mental model shift actually happened. What I expected vs what I got I expected reading blockchain data to feel like calling a mysterious, slow, complex API. Something with heavy setup, authentication tokens, and confusing docs. What I got was this: const { value : lamports } = await rpc . getBalance ( address ). send (); const sol = Number ( lamports ) / 1 _000_000_000 ; Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode No API key. No login. No permissions. Anyone can call this for any address, anytime. In Web2, if I want someone's account balance, I need DB credentials, role permissions, and middleware. On Solana, I just ask. Publicly.…