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Why "kbin"?

Hi there! So I'm two weeks in to kbin and I think I have a layman's understanding of the fediverse, but I'm still not the most technical person, so I thought I'd just post my questions here.

So I know "fediverse" stands for federated universe, so does "kbin" also stand for something? I tried checking the FAQ but the about page just tells me it's a link aggregator, and google links me to a Japanese manufacturing site or those birth name meaning/ancestry sites. (can anyone tell me if lemmy also stands for something or is this just a word the developers came up with?)

Regarding defederation, does it affect previous posts? If there's a thread with comments by multiple people under different instances, does defederating break the chain?

In fact who "owns" a thread? Like, in which instance is it stored? If someone posts on kbin, and people from lemmy and beehaw comment on it, does kbin "keep" all of those stored away or do they stay in their respective instances?

And am I correct in thinking that instances who defederate essentially block off an instance, but that instance can still see their posts, but not interact? ie. Instance A defederates from B, so they can't see/interact with B, but B can still see A but not interact with them? Or is it a mutual blocking? Ergo they both can't see nor interact. I know beehaw defederated with lemmy recently, so...?

The whole concept of defederating is just so interesting to me. I know I have to read more about it but those were mostly my main questions.

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  • I think the name kbin, which is officially /kbin, is a play on the term /sbin, which is a system directory on unix based systems that houses binary files which require root privileges to run.

    I don't know how @ernest got from /sbin to /kbin though. Maybe he told the story somewhere but I haven't seen it.

    • Yeah, I was hoping I could find an old post from him regarding the name, but google just shows me code, and I didn't want to bother him because I imagine he's busy. 😅

      • He talked about it on the polish instance. Someone accused him of some serious stuff and he explained where all the naming came from in the comments: https://karab.in/m/fediverse/p/217281/The-reason-for-the-strange-naming-and-uncomfortable-images-on#post-comment-311421

        • Wow he handled those outlandish claims with tact. Imagine not understanding something and immediately deciding that it’s ammophilia and naziism

        • That's a pretty solid response, IMO. The OP in that thread is clearly reaching and looking for an argument when there isn't one to be made. I'm not the type to accuse somebody of being "triggered", but they're definitely overreacting. The fact that they have to reference a .png of a storm trooper and a still frame from Monty Python as their "evidence" speaks volumes.

          I hope they find an instance that's more suited to their sensibilities.

          • For real. Ernest handled that shit like a boss. Very cool to see.

          • I'm still hung up on the association of the word "magazine" with firearms before publications.

            In the context of a discussion forum, how do you skip over the very obvious meaning unless you are looking for dogwhistles in everything.

            I am also as sensitive as any social justice conscious person to known dogwhistles, but looking for them in a conspiratorial manner is a bit too much I think.

    • he did say something like this, i think in relation to linux or something

    • The "k" could be for k-hole?

      I remember many years ago, there was a popular Blogspot-style page called Internet K-Hole that did periodic massive dumps of random found photos from the 70s and 80s. Back in those days of slow DSL, the page took minutes to load. All images were old and from scans. Many Polaroids. Some of the images were pretty faded, giving a sense of patina. In some the camera was out of focus, so they were blurry. Peppered throughout were scans from erotic magazines that were already defunct at the time, such as Oui, Chic, High Society, Gallery, etc.

      Internet K-Hole was the first page of its' type and size with that kitschy aesthetic sense. Whenever there was an update of images, word spread around the forums of the day, like Boing Boing and Slashdot.

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