How do I go about defining my own Kind so I can play around and not clutter up the UX of a social. Do I just pick my own number that isn't already defined and just got with it?

Am I missing something in my understanding? From what I've been able to figure out, nostr is sending the same data to multiple servers over web sockets with a crypto signature proving you sent the data and those multiple servers rebroadcast the data to clients connected to the server. The server can also be setup to store the data so a client can connect later and fetch the data they're looking for, but this isn't strictly necessary.

If I post a message on nostr, is the only way to guarantee it doesn't get deleted is to run my own relay and store all my messages on my relay?

One problem podcasting has, and the Podcast Index is no different, is for it to be widely searchable, a directory is needed. That's what the Podcast Index is. They upload the database every Saturday for anyone that wants to use it instead of relying on the Index, but you'll always be 1-7 days behind the Index. The reality is though, most PC2.0 apps rely on getting feed info from the Index. One thing nostr may be good for is having several copies of the Index available so if one server goes down, the others are available as a back up. I don't know enough about nostr to say how that would work or if it would, but if any of you nostriches are up to the challenge, having the Index across several relays would be huge. Here's the latest upload of the database. https://public.podcastindex.org/podcastindex_feeds.db.tgz

If I'm on Damus and you're on Snort, and I send a message, does it get stored on both Damus and Snort, or does it get stored on Damus, and when you get on Snort, Damus fetches the message and sends it to Snort. Once Snort gets it, does it store it as well?

When I send a message on nostr, where is that message stored so someone is able to see it a few days later?

I wonder if nostriches and podcasters are one people separated by a common language. What I mean by that is I hear stuff like RSS is okay, but nostr is better because it's decentralized. I've always seen podcasting (which is RSS) as decentralized, so I'm left wondering what does someone who says something like that mean by decentralized?

Saw @Murmur 's profile. Stealing the first line. Loved it. "Strong opinions loosely held"