That makes some sense. Also, some of the ecosystem helps to amplify or reinforce or check work, but also, it sounds like, for some of the efforts combatting, not recreating the work or taking away from.

Taiwan FactCheck Center, involved in that as well?

I’d love to hear more about the process of moving from identification to dissemination. Something I was less clear on was how many people are we talking about who are involved in this process, or hours per week, and are we talking about people…

On Line…

I know. I was very big on WhatsApp, because earlier in the year, I was in India. Then the United States is popular, too. When I got here, everyone immediately said, “You need to be on Line. This is where…”

PPT, yeah. Is there anything that’s being, either like a bot or accounts on WhatsApp?

Line today, I’ve seen some of the messaging on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. Is there anything I’m missing relating to WhatsApp?

I’ve noticed the very clear, “Here is the cycle of when you can go.”

One thing that I’ve heard, and I welcome your reaction on, is that, especially compared to the United States, there’s much less anti-vaccine or vaccine disinformation.

I would say, especially as someone whose language skills are limited, it’s very visually representative of, “This is the case numbers, and here’s how you can link to more text. Maybe you can translate it.”

I’ve been a big fan of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. It’s both the Twitter account and then the Facebook one. Even beyond the misinformation, I’ve found it very clear in communicating correct information.

Are these mostly posted on the websites that’s closest to whatever the issue is, so Ministry of Health and Welfare?

Most of this, I’ve always been intrigued. I’ve seen a couple of times the wiggling butt. [laughs]

The two modes, is that in a single post, or is it like make sure you release a text post, but also…

At that point, there are more people who’ve heard it, too.

It’s a good way of thinking about it. I really like the inoculation message, too, because I think it helps on a couple of friends. The two hours, I’ve always been curious, is that just because it’s quick, it’s very easy to set, or is there a specific reason for ...

I’ve heard the theory, if it’s not caught, and one of the reasons why it’s so important to think preventatively about how you diagnose and identify, there’s the risk that people might say, “Oh, yes, I saw this a few weeks back, and it didn’t have the label. Now that ...

That, I thought, has been one of the most encouraging moves this year, to be more transparent on who is this account, or who has been sharing this?

Am I correct in thinking, one of the challenges that I’ve heard is, even if you get out that correction that says, “Oh, this image was doctored.” if it takes too long, people who’ve seen it might say, “Oh, sure this…”

Most of those that went truly viral related to political issues or maybe societal questions, like how do we…

That’s incredibly helpful, thank you. That actually relates to another question I had. I think looking at something Doublethink Lab wrote, they’ve mentioned that in terms of the virality while there’s been a lot of misinformation posts of the, “Can I drink garlic water?” type things, that’s been less viral ...

This is a very basic question, because my knowledge is limited here. I’ve heard you mentioned before, what exactly is an R value? Is it just the measure of how…

I love that movie.

How do you think, then, about if you see online people approaching the questions or citizens are tackling it? What do you see as the role, “of government” is not the right word.

That’s a very fair point. In situations, though, where it might be unclear…

That’s a good point.

I’m thinking where the WHO and others, the US, threw a little bit of question mark onto the mask situation, even the…

Thinking about the initial landscape, one of the questions that I always wonder about, when a pandemic is starting, it’s not always clear what is fact versus fiction, because sometimes, the scientific studies might be a little bit lagging.

Yeah.

Oh, my gosh. I’m going to have to tell a couple of my friends that, because they had the same question, if you have that kind of dog, and they thought it was…

I didn’t know that.

I was going to ask, why the Shiba Inu in particular? Is it because it’s so popular in Taiwan?

I was going to say, I’m normally not a dog person, but following the social media, it’s very cute.

Yeah, or I mean, “Oh, it’s just very clear what the answer should be, so no one should fall for misinformation.”

My initial question for thinking about the misinformation challenge is I see so many people who will say, “Oh, misinformation about public health is really easy to address, because it’s all…”

I’d love to hear.

Then, because that’s not enough area, I have a lot of early questions bouncing around in my mind about smart cities. Maybe…

The bulk of my questions and interests are first focused around how Taiwan as a democracy deals with misinformation, specifically, about COVID, then some on the ways that it’s responded to COVID more broadly, including the biosurveillance mechanisms.

I saw. It’s nice.

For Taiwan, that’s involved looking at a couple areas, which, depending on the amount of questions, I might only get to the first one versus three.

This year has been an attempt to bring the two more clearly together.

Excellent. I have some questions that are a little bit all over the map, based on my interests and research. Maybe just a little bit of background about me, my original academic focus has been technology policy, but over the last decade at NBR, I’ve moved into looking at energy, ...

I know you have quite a busy schedule, too.

[laughs] Which, if you can do it, is great.

I know makes some people nervous, and it’s just not a good…