What Does 'Jjalbang' Mean?

Originated on DC Inside in the early 2000s back when the site was strictly a digital-camera community organized around photo galleries rather than text boards: a post without an attached photo relevant to the gallery's topic would get deleted ("잘림," jjallim) by moderators. From around late 2002, users began attaching any random picture — regardless of relevance — purely to keep their text posts from being cut, calling these throwaway attachments 짤림 방지용, "attached to prevent cutting," which contracted into 짤방 (jjalbang). The word later broadened from "an image posted to avoid deletion" to simply "a funny/shareable meme image" as its original technical necessity faded, becoming the root term for a whole family of derived words including 움짤 and 짤줍.