fedia.io is running mbin, which is a fork of kbin. It seems to be doing well, so you could switch to Lemmy/mbin if you don't want to include kbin any more but still want to show alternate clients are possible.
The reason it worked is because sometimes burnout is a real problem, and getting extra help is a real solution. The fact that this was exploited in one situation doesn't mean that all of a sudden there isn't any real burnout or genuine offers to help any more.
A project can sometimes benefit from help even if there is no burnout. People have limits.
I didn't say anything about burning out. A job can be too big or difficult for a person without them burning out.
Ultimately, it's just a question of results. If kbin.social is working poorly but other alternatives are doing good, I move on. That works well in the Fediverse especially, as evidenced that I am commenting from fedia.io.
No, he's not. Kbin was recently down for a week. Then voting and comment counts broke. Before all that I had to get into the habit of reloading the page I was on every time I wanted to vote on something. It's a terrible user experience.
That's not to say I don't like him or he's not a good dev or whatever. Just that people have limits and it sure seems like he's bumping against his.