Facebook: From the 'Stealing Vegetables' Craze to the Double-Edged Sword of Digital Democracy, Defining Taiwan's Social Blueprints for Two Decades

30-Second Overview:
The development history of Facebook (FB) in Taiwan is a compressed version of 20 years of digital social history: from the 2009 "stealing vegetables" craze of Happy Farm, to the core online mobilization of the 2014 Sunflower Student Movement, to the "FB refugee wave" triggered by Meta's speech review controversies in 2025. It serves simultaneously as Taiwan's largest public discussion square and the most active front line of cognitive warfare. By the end of 2025, Facebook's reach in Taiwan still exceeded 75%, but its market share continued to decline from 61% in 2022 to below 50%, shrinking for three consecutive years.

"Did you steal vegetables today?" This greeting swept through Taiwanese offices and campuses in 2009, originating from a web game called Happy Farm¹. At the time, Facebook, which had just entered the Taiwanese market, leveraged this simple game that prompted office workers to set alarms in the middle of the night to "harvest crops" to break through 5.7 million visits in Taiwan in August 2009². Taiwan even became one of the most popular markets for Happy Farm globally³.

📝 Curator's Note: In an era before smartphones were ubiquitous, Facebook used "games" as the lowest-barrier social method to move Taiwanese people's social circles from the physical world to the cloud, allowing it to stand out in competition with Plurk (Pulang), a microblogging platform popular in Taiwan at the time⁴.

From Harvard Dorms to Taipei Offices

Facebook's origins date back to February 2004, when Mark Zuckerberg and his Harvard roommate set up "TheFacebook" in a dorm room⁵. Initially just a campus contact book, its real-name system and closed-circle characteristics spread rapidly among Ivy League schools. In the United States, Facebook started as a student social network; in Taiwan, it directly captured the strongest consumer base among office workers and middle-aged groups through social games like Happy Farm⁶, laying the foundation for "all-age" coverage.

Meta's office in Taiwan was established in 2015, with its initial three employees squeezed into a small conference room. In 2019, the Taiwan office moved to the Nanshan Plaza building in Taipei, occupying an entire floor of 804 ping (approx. 2,650 sq meters), equipped with Taiwanese employee facilities such as KTVs and mahjong tables, publicly declaring a long-term investment in the Taiwanese market⁷.

The Mobilization Map of the Sunflower Student Movement

If 2009 was Facebook's "social first year" in Taiwan, 2014 was its "political first year."

During the March 2014 Sunflower Student Movement, Facebook demonstrated astonishing mobilization energy: live broadcasts, material fundraising, and discourse dissemination all occurred simultaneously on Facebook. Academic research shows that Facebook usage related to the student movement had a significant impact on whether college students participated; the level of participation driven by weak ties (strange netizens) was even higher than that driven by strong ties (relatives and friends)⁸.

However, Facebook's role in this movement was also double-edged—information overload, the spread of misinformation, and community polarization emerged simultaneously⁹. This movement completely changed Taiwan's political ecology and established Facebook as the发声 (voice) infrastructure for civil society, political figures, and NGOs.

Diti Expedition and the Trade of Fan Pages

Facebook's expanding influence in Taiwan also made it a front line for cross-strait cognitive warfare.

In 2016, following the Zhou Ziyu flag incident, some Chinese netizens initiated the "Diti Expedition" action via Facebook, flooding comments on relevant Taiwanese fan pages and forming cross-border cyber conflicts¹⁰. In 2019, the Investigation Bureau publicly stated that it was continuously monitoring cross-strait forces attempting to buy Taiwanese fan pages for political propaganda¹¹, revealing the structural vulnerability of Facebook as a cross-border information battlefield.

Algorithm Black Boxes and Media Dependence

As Facebook transformed into Meta, the algorithm black box, opaque ad revenue sharing, and control over news media traffic gradually sparked dissatisfaction. Many Taiwanese news media heavily rely on traffic brought by Facebook; any adjustment to the algorithm could severely impact revenue, creating an inescapable "traffic dependence"¹².

For a long time, there have been controversies regarding "Red FB" and "Green FB" in the review standards for political speech on Facebook in Taiwan¹³. Creators have also had their accounts suspended without warning, causing years of accumulated digital assets to vanish overnight¹⁴.

2025: The FB Refugee Wave

The most severe crisis of trust erupted in 2025. Reports indicated that Meta collaborated with specific political forces to conduct opaque reviews and down-ranking of popular posts in Taiwan and Hong Kong, with many accounts discussing public issues being banned without warning¹⁵. The famous "FB Refugee Wave" in Taiwan's internet history was thus triggered—approximately 20,000 users flooded decentralized platforms like Mastodon¹⁶.

Meta officially clarified, stating it had never accepted content review requests from the Chinese government for Taiwan users nor shared Taiwan user data; content reviews are handled by a local Traditional Chinese team in Taiwan based on global community guidelines¹⁷.

📝 Curator's Note: When social platforms become public infrastructure, their review standards directly impact democratic operations—this goes beyond the scope of commerce.

Anti-Fake News Actions

Facing the complex online environment, Meta also promoted anti-fake news strategies in Taiwan. From October to December 2019, Facebook cracked down heavily on Taiwanese content farms "violating content guidelines," with over a hundred fan pages, including "Mi Xun," being delisted en masse¹⁸. In November of the same year, Facebook held a hackathon in Taipei themed around "fighting misinformation"¹⁹.

Current Status: High Reach, Continuous Loss of Stickiness

By the end of 2025, Facebook's reach in Taiwan remained the highest among all platforms (exceeding 75%), but its market share continued to decline from 61.22% in 2022²⁰. Meta's Threads, however, rose rapidly in Taiwan after the 2024 general election due to a more open atmosphere for political discussion²¹. According to 2026 data, Taiwanese users contributed 21.08% of Threads' global total traffic, making it one of the countries with the highest participation rates globally²².

Facebook's story is a microcosm of Taiwan's 20-year digital transformation: it taught Taiwanese people to socialize in virtual farms, learn civic mobilization on the streets outside the Legislative Yuan, and rethink the boundaries of digital trust amidst review controversies. Today, it finds itself in an awkward position—it remains the largest platform, yet also the one people complain about most.

Further Reading:

• IG: From Photographers' Filters to Taiwan's 'Crispy' Anxiety — Another major Meta platform in Taiwan, forming different usage scenarios with Facebook: FB is for "contacting elders," IG is for "looking at yourself," and Threads is the "big argument square."
• Threads in Taiwan — Why do Taiwanese people call Threads "Crispy"? From the FB refugee wave to "Crispy" being the global traffic leader, the unique position of Taiwanese users in the Meta ecosystem.
• History of Taiwan's Online Community Migration — From BBS, PChome Hot Space, Plurk to Facebook, IG, and Threads. To understand why Facebook rose and why it is now receding in Taiwan, one needs this complete migration map.

References