EverydayKorea.com

Given the fact that Wikipedia has somewhere around 900,000 articles and grows at a phenomenal rate whereas Galbijim is still going for 15,000, why not just use Wikipedia? Why make a new wiki?

Here are the reasons for making an entirely new wiki, and some of the things we can do that Wikipedia can't:

• The Galbijim Wiki lets you put up information in much greater detail. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and information there must be general and applicable to the average person. A page of Seoul is acceptable there as well as here, but a page on List of movie theatres that do not show credits or Tax issues for Canadian expats would be deleted. Also, information for example on a nice restaurant in a little town somewhere, good places to stay for a night and so on, would not be acceptable on Wikipedia. Here, just about any information is acceptable as long as it pertains to Korea.
• The Galbijim Wiki is also a travel guide. Unlike Wikipedia, our policies are relaxed enough so that we can also take the wiki in the direction of a travel and living guide. A more robust online version of Lonely Planet, with articles on thousands of businesses, restaurants, and services in Korea, whereas Wikipedia's site policies restrict such things. An example of this would be to look at one of our subway station articles versus the avg subway station article on Wikipedia.
• The Galbijim Wiki is not just an encyclopedia. This site can be used as a dictionary as well, and pages with a Korean-language title are acceptable. 김밥천국 for example is a fine title for a page if there is no English word for something. Pages on single Korean words, hanja, and anything else are fine as well. Pages like these would be moved to Wiktionary, but even on Wiktionary the structure is a bit formal whereas over here you are allowed to write things such as "do not use this word with older people", "this is the hanja that appears often in newspaper articles related to x", and so on. Though not completely informal (no writing in the first person), the feel of a page here should be similar to a conversation with an experienced person who has been in Korea for a long time and knows what they are talking about.
• The Galbijim Wiki is also a library. We can directly upload books with expired copyright (see List of online books), judicial decisions (Supreme Court decisions for example), the Constitution of the Republic of Korea, and anything else that is either lacking copyright or is under a license such as Creative Commons or GNU Free Document License. Basically, if it pertains to Korea and it is permitted to be used, put it up.
• The Galbijim Wiki is a large Korean language resource. You can create Korean language courses here if you want (see List of Korean lessons). If you wish you may record sound files as well (.ogg files) to upload, you can create your own images, upload your own images or pictures, or use ones from a permissable source, and make as large a course as you want. Ideally the Galbijim Wiki will have hundreds and hundreds of lessons and pages on Korean language that will be suitable for all levels.
• The Galbijim Wiki is useful for specific online communities. You can use the Galbijim Wiki to make portals suitable for an online community. The Main Page has certain categories for pages that will likely be of interest to the average user, but there are way more pages than there is room on the main page, and it is easy to create a portal for certain topics. A Busan-related portal would be feasible, as would one with topics related to people married to Koreans, a portal for those doing something else besides English teaching, a portal for life as a gyopo, and so on. For an example of how these can look, see this one and this one on Wikipedia.
• The Galbijim Wiki is open to your ideas. If you come up with a great idea for something that you think a wiki would be the perfect place for, either start it on your own if you know how, come to the Community Portal to suggest your idea, or leave a message on a talk page of one of the administrators here. Basically, just about anything Korea-related, without copyright problems and helpful to an expat in Korea is okay.