competition?

[mdfloyd@gmail.com]

I have a niche related to exotic pets. I've been planning to do a wikipedia-type site about this particular type of pet -- but Wikipedia already has a lot of links and information on them.

Now I'm trying to decide if I'd be wasting my time by repeating what Wikipedia already has. I know a lot of the experts in the field and many of them would be thrilled to contribute content or let me copy some of their stuff. As far as I can tell, they haven't contributed to Wikipedia -- but because of the way wikipedias are designed Wikipedia and I can legitimately copy and use one another's content. There's a ton of useful stuff already on Wikipedia I'd like to use on my site.

So would I be wasting my time and energy or am I looking at this all wrong?