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SYNOPSIS
Rachel and Dan talk to Dr. Adam Ratner, author of the new book Booster Shots, about the misinformation he encounters as a pediatric infectious disease specialist. We discuss the distinctions between vaccine hesitancy and being anti-vax, and how misinformation has an impact beyond individual healthcare. Dan uses the discussion to highlight a new “lens” called double-tagging, and Rachel is inspired to establish the lens “frenzy.”

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STORIES OF DISINFORMATION

The Fifth Column

Rachel describes how the US used the fictional threat of a “fifth column” to bolster their argument for Japanese internment camps.

• A Brief History of Japanese American Relocation During World War II (National Park Service)
• How a Public Media Campaign Led to Japanese Incarceration during WWII (GBH - American Experience)
• Of Spies and G-Men: How the U.S. Government Turned Japanese Americans into Enemies of the State (densho.org)

Reciprocal Tariffs

Dan highlights some of the more subtle and insidious misinformation about Trump’s tariffs.

• Trade deficits and truth deficits (Julian Sanchez)
• PBS interview of Justin Wolfers
• Jake Tapper interview of Ag secretary Rollins

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INTERVIEW WITH DR ADAM RATNER

• Dr. Adam Ratner
• Adam’s book: Booster Shots: The Urgent Lesson of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children’s Health
• 2019 measles outbreak in New York City (New England Journal of Medicine)
• Brooklyn measles outbreak: How a glossy booklet spread anti-vaccine messages in Orthodox Jewish communities (NBC News)

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LENSES

Double-tagging

Seemingly innocuous labels can be turned into misinformation by applying them in a way that is technically accurate, but twists the meaning of the label. Tagging anti-vax information with the label “vaccines” is misleading, and undermines the integrity of the system.

• How might tags and classification schemes be co-opted to threaten the system’s integrity?
• How does the system’s classification scheme adapt to deal with neutral terms that have become loaded?

Frenzy

Information systems have a responsibility to help users understand what’s truly important and/or urgent. Systems must avoid contributing to the frenzy of information.

• How does the system help participants prioritize without causing a fre

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Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

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Unchecked is a production of Curious Squid

Curious Squid is a digital design consulting firm specializing in information architecture, user experience, and product design

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SYNOPSIS

Dan and Rachel talk with Cyd Harrell about the challenges of providing information to citizens that is accurate and accessible, even when it needs to be official and formal. Rachel discusses the Accuracy as a lens for evaluating information ecosystems. Dan explains the lens Accountability.

EPISODE CONTENTS

Stories of Disinformation

Dan describes misinformation from the Bush administration that provided the impetus for the US invasion of Iraq

• The Iraq Invasion 20 Years Later (Mother Jones)
• Lie by Lie: A Timeline of How We Got Into Iraq (Mother Jones)
• The Other "Big Lie" and Our Democratic Fragility (Harvard Kennedy School)

Rachel describes how the US National Park Rangers handle messaging guidelines from the Trump administration

Interview with Cyd Harrell

• Cyd's book, A Civic Technologist's Practice Guide

Lenses

Accuracy

It turns out accuracy is a spectrum, and sometimes information is "accurate enough" for the purposes of the people using it. At the same time, some domains require information that is precise, even when that isn't required by all users.

• How does the system define and uphold an acceptable threshold for accuracy? 
• How does the system ensure information is precise? 

Accountable

When information is held accountable, it is subjected to outside critique and validation. Perfectly closed systems prevent information from being scrutinized. But also, systems that appear open can be compromised.

• How does the system encourage sources to be accountable for their contributions? 
• How does the system enable outside criticism and give it equal weight to the original contributions?

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Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Unchecked is a production of Curious Squid

Curious Squid is a digital design consulting firm specializing in information architecture, user experience, and product design

Send us a text

Stories of Disinformation

Rachel told the story of disinformation in ancient Rome: Octavian’s campaign against Mark Antony.

• The Propaganda of Octavian
• Fake news about Antony and Cleopatra
• BBC: A brief history of fake news
• A short guide to the history of fake news and disinformation

Dan recounted the story of how the Department of Homeland Security is manipulating search engine results… Or are they?

• The Guardian: A mirage of mass deportations
• Gizmodo: A little bit of HTML doing a lot of work

Interview with Susannah Fox

• Susannah's Web site
• Rebel Health, Susannah's book (affiliate link)

Lenses

Interrogable

Information ecosystems sometimes keep participants in the dark, preventing them from understanding more about the information conveyed. While opacity in a system can make it easier to understand, preventing users from becoming disoriented or overwhelmed, it also does not invite users to think critically about the information presented.

• How does the system invite users to interrogate the information being conveyed?
• In other words, how does the system make the "invisible" visible, so that it can be interrogated?

Self-Regulating

In peer-to-peer patient support communities, there are mechanisms that allow community members to indicate the reliability of posted information. If online spaces are like gardens, they should be community gardens, where any participant can contribute to the health of the information. 

• How does your system allow participants to regulate the information within the system?

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Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Unchecked is a production of Curious Squid

Curious Squid is a digital design consulting firm specializing in information architecture, user experience, and product design

Send us a text

Introducing Unchecked, the podcast about the architecture of disinformation. Exaggerations, misinformation, and falsehoods seem to be everywhere these days. No domain, no online space, no information ecosystem is safe from this invasive species. Dan and Rachel, two professional information architects, turn their attention to this growing threat in the hopes of developing strategies and methods for building better systems.

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Topics:

• Snopes teaches us the challenge of checking sources
• Disinformation in history: The role of misinformation in spreading influenza in 1918
• Disinformation today: LA fires and water “shortages”
• Defining disinformation
• Defining information architecture, and positioning it relative to disinformation
• Our objectives for this podcast

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Sources:

• AP article covering misinformation in the LA Fires
• Scripps News article about the use of disinformation in the 1918 Influenza pandemic

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Personnel:

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

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Music:

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Personnel

• Dan Brown, Host
• Rachel Price, Host
• Emily Duncan, Editor

Music

• Turtle Up Fool, by Elliot

_____________________________________________________

Unchecked is a production of Curious Squid

Curious Squid is a digital design consulting firm specializing in information architecture, user experience, and product design