Welcome to a new galaxy … created on the Web

The Galaxiki web site is a new kind of community portal that allows its members to edit stars, planets and moons in a virtual galaxy, creating an entire fictional world online.

Galaxiki is a word that combines Galaxy and wiki – the term for online collaborative content areas – but that hardly begins to describe its web site at http://www.galaxiki.org.

The idea behind Galaxiki is that community members can create fictional life forms and write about their histories on their planets. The ease of use attracts all kinds of users, so that the target audience is not limited to science fiction and astronomy addicts.

“It’s very exciting to see how many people like Galaxiki. We got a lot of positive feedback and many suggestions in the last seven weeks since launch””, said Jos Kirps, the creator of Galaxiki. “”The site is being updated on a regular basis, new features emerge nearly every day: improved galaxy exploration tools, search tools, planetary editors or translated content, for example. We have now launched a movies and books section, a completely new site area where community members can manage their private collections of DVDs or books and share information about them. And we still have a lot more in the pipeline.””

Galaxiki combines well known web 2.0 features in a revolutionary new way. Millions of stars, planets, moons, pulsars and black holes can be explored using an intuitive 2D map.

“”We’re now looking for people willing to help us with translations – German and French versions of the site are already partly available, other languages are being prepared””, says Jos Kirps. “”Just like any other community site, we heavily rely on active users, and we’re looking forward to see people from all over the world become part of our world.””

Galaxiki membership and editing community stars is free, but it’s also possible to purchase your own solar system that only you will be able to edit. Galaxiki also features an online shop offering astronomy, science and science fiction related articles, such as DVDs, books or T-Shirts.

The Galaxiki Project is headquartered in Ehlerange, Luxembourg, Europe and is currently run as a private project by its creator Jos Kirps, although he hopes to transformed it into a company in the near future.

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