This site introduces Taiwan through geography, governance, industry, language, and daily cases. Each kind of source has a different scope: maps establish location, official sources describe institutions, statistics describe population and industry, and local archives and community accounts add lived experience. Images are entry points, not substitutes for any single political narrative or a community’s own voice.
Homepage images and usage notes
| Image | Use on the site | Source and usage note |
|---|---|---|
| Taiwan relief location map | Locating the main island, nearby islands, and terrain | Uwe Dedering; CC BY-SA 3.0; Wikimedia Commons. |
| Taiwan NASA Terra MODIS 23791 | Seeing the island outline and surrounding waters from space | Jeff Schmaltz / NASA GSFC; public domain; Wikimedia Commons. |
| Taipei night market photo | Seeing vendors, pedestrians, and the evening economy | Huy Phan; Pexels; used under the Pexels License. |
| Taipei 101 photo | Seeing a city landmark, architecture, and global connection | Costa Karabelas; Pexels; used under the Pexels License. |
| Twemoji Taiwan flag SVG | Website favicon, header brand mark, and PWA icons | The header and favicon use Twemoji's Taiwan flag artwork rather than the operating system's emoji font; the artwork is used under Twemoji's CC BY 4.0 license; local PNG sizes remain as installation-compatible PWA fallbacks; used only as site identification, not as a substitute for political or community context. |
Pexels images are displayed from the Pexels CDN, with the source page, photographer, and usage note kept beside the image. Wikimedia Commons images keep their original page and license information for further checking.
Real cases and first-party gateways
| Case | What it shows on this site | First-party source |
|---|---|---|
| The first direct presidential election in 1996 | Democratic institutions operating through voting, campaigns, election administration, and local mobilization. | Central Election Commission |
| Marriage-equality legislation in 2019 | Constitutional interpretation, legislative procedure, social movements, and family life meeting in one event. | Constitutional Court Interpretation No. 748, Executive Yuan explanation |
| Taiwan High Speed Rail in operation since 2007 | A dense transport axis connecting western cities and changing commuting, returning home, and business travel. | Taiwan High Speed Rail |
| Hsinchu Science Park and semiconductors | Research, talent, manufacturing, suppliers, water, and urban life pulling on one another in a region. | Hsinchu Science Park, Science Park Exploration Museum |
| The 1999 Chi-Chi earthquake and disaster preparation | Building safety, monitoring, drills, mutual aid, and reconstruction becoming long-term public work. | Central Weather Administration, National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering |
Public-data gateways
- Taiwan government portal: an index of government agencies and public services.
- Central Weather Administration: weather, earthquakes, typhoons, and disaster information.
- Ministry of Culture: cultural policy, heritage, and public cultural resources.
- Council of Indigenous Peoples: Indigenous policy, culture, language, and history.
- National Development Council: public information on population, industry, and social development.
- Taiwan Government Data Open Platform: datasets and open-data index.
Editorial use principles
- Every source has a date, scope, producer, and vocabulary. No single source is expanded into a complete account of Taiwan.
- Maps describe location, terrain, or administrative range. Political status requires the map’s purpose and context to be stated separately.
- Statistics need their year, definition, population, and omissions read together; a number is not a complete social experience.
- Local stories and community memory retain an important place for residents and communities to speak for themselves. Retelling keeps the source and its limits visible.