Overview of Korea's Alan (앨런) AI and Zum integration

Here's a brief overview of another domestic AI model made by Korea's own EST corp: "Alan" (앨런).

Alan is another ChatGPT-like model with a focus on web searches. You can try it out right now at https://myalan.ai where you get free access without logging in. If you hit your usage limit you can create an EST account with just an e-mail address if you decide you like it and get more usage. You may remember ESTsoft aka "east soft" (이스트소프트) as the makers of that little egg-looking app that Koreans use to unzip files (Alzip 알집) and the other one that's a virus checker (Alyac 알약). Sticking with the AL theme, we now have Alan 앨런. "Al" means egg in Korean, thus the egg logos.

Alan (앨런) as standalone chatbot

Right on the homepage you'll see a familiar interface. Just go ahead and start asking questions.

ESTsoft's Alan (앨런) AI

Much like Perplexity or Poe or other chatbot sites, it has a dropdown menu letting you choose from a variety of LLM models including Claude, Gemini, ChatGPT etc. Let's stick with the latest Alan model for now.

Multiple LLM models

I started with a simple question: what's the return policy at Olive Young? (a popular Korean cosmetics shop). Here's its answer:

Sample question and answer from Alan

올리브영에서 구매하신 상품의 **반품 규정**에 대해 안내해 드리겠습니다.

### 주요 반품 정보

* **반품 비용**: 반품 시 **회수 비용으로 2,500원**이 발생할 수 있습니다[(출처2)](https://www.oliveyoung.co.kr/store/counsel/getFaqList.do).
* **매장 반품**: **매장 반품 시에는 별도의 회수 비용 없이** 반품이 가능합니다[(출처2)](https://www.oliveyoung.co.kr/store/counsel/getFaqList.do).
* **반품 신청 기간**: 회원은 상품을 공급받은 날로부터 **3개월 이내**, 또는 그 사실을 안 날 또는 알 수 있었던 날로부터 **30일 이내**에 반품을 신청할 수 있습니다[(출처4)](https://www.oliveyoung.co.kr/store/counsel/getNoticeDetail.do?ntcSeq=57385&trackingCd=Home_LB&t_page=%ED%99%88&t_click=%EB%9D%A0%EB%B0%B0%EB%84%88&t_banner_name=%EC%9D%B4%EC%9A%A9%EC%95%BD%EA%B4%80%20%EA%B0%9C%EC%A0%95%20%EC%95%88%EB%82%B4&t_number=1).

### 기타 참고 사항

* **쿠폰 복구**: 고객 귀책 사유(단순 변심 등)로 인한 반품의 경우에는 쿠폰이 **자동 복구되지 않습니다**[(출처5)](https://www.oliveyoung.co.kr/store/counsel/getFaqList.do?faqLrclCd=200&faqMdclCd=204).
* **매장 반품 바코드**: 매장 반품을 위해 바코드를 신청하는 경우, 바코드는 영업일 기준 **최대 24시간 이내**에 발송됩니다[(출처7)](https://www.oliveyoung.co.kr/store/counsel/getFaqList.do?faqLrclCd=300).

더 자세한 내용은 올리브영 공식 웹사이트의 FAQ를 참고하시는 것이 가장 정확합니다.

OK, that answer looks pretty good, and clearly references the official Olive Young site as sources.

How about asking the same question in English?

English interaction with Alan

No problem there either. Looks to me like it gathered the same answer as Korean and just translated it. Not bad.

Zum integration

Zum (줌, unfortunately a name nearly coopted by the video meetings app Zoom) is a less popular Korean portal site similar to Naver or Daum. They seem to use Alan for their own AI search so I figured I'd give it a try too just for comparison.

Star with a simple basic fact-based question: what's the tallest building in Busan?

Alan integration in Zum portal site

부산에서 가장 높은 건물이 어디인가요?
부산에서 가장 높은 건물은 해운대 엘시티 랜드마크 타워로, 101층에 높이는 411m입니다. [출처01](https://www.kookje.co.kr/news2011/asp/newsbody.asp?code=8800&key=20250513.22014002826)

Not bad. Quick, direct, accurate answer. Apparently it's the Haeundae LCT "The Sharp" Landmark Tower.

But then I asked it the same Olive Young question and got this:

올리브영에서 구매한 것이 반품 규정이 어떻게 되나요?
올리브영에서 구매한 제품의 반품 규정에 대한 정보는 제공된 자료에서 확인되지 않습니다. 다만, '2080 치약'이 포함된 케라시스 여행용 세트 프리미엄 상품의 경우, 사용기한이 지나지 않았다면 환불이 가능하다고 언급되어 있습니다. [출처03](https://www.newsfc.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=76104)

Apparently it not only doesn't know the answer, but is making assumptions based on an old news article about a toothpaste recall. Seems like it might be using just a limited set of data, maybe from Zum's own crawled database? Was standalone Alan searching the web on it's own to distill an answer? I'm guessing here since even the standard results on Zum were hardly useful, mostly just ads to Olive Young product sales. Doesn't seem like a great advertisement for this Alan product but I doubt many eyeballs are seeing it anyway. Strange since IIRC Zum is actually owned by ESTsoft, so makes sense they could easily integrate the two.

Try it yourself

Maybe not highly useful to most readers but always fun to see new AI models localized for specific markets. You can apparently even get all your answers in Jeju dialect if you want. Bookmark it as another resource to try for getting info focused more on Korean sites.

It also does stuff like YouTube summarization and all the other bells and whistles most chatbots do these days.

Try it yourself if you want:

You also might be interested in this older post: Using A.dot (에이닷) LLM to AI chat about Yoon's martial law order - 10원 Tips

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