I'm not a fan of magnesium blocks because of the difficulty in scraping it off, stopping it from blowing away, and then igniting it. It's hard to do with one hand. If you manage it, the magnesium doesn't burn for long anyway.

I'm also not a fan of matches as they are bulky for the number of lights you get, and in my experience they don't age well. Plus they are surprisingly hard to use - give an average Joe 3 matches and he'll really struggle to light a fire with them, especially outdoors.

My preferred methods are:
  • Butane cigarette lighter. Doesn't have to be BIC. I've not found a liquid fuel lighter I like enough to carry.
  • Spark-lite. It's what I've had the most success with, given good tinder.
  • Ferro rod. Simplest and therefore most reliable, but hard to use one-handed.
What ever you use, good tinder really helps. Nowadays when I'm camping I use a combination of lighter and tinder-card. (Tinder-card isn't ideal, because it's not water-proof, but I happen to have masses of it spare.)
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Quality is addictive.