Last weekend's massive protest was unusual in that it wasn't mobilized by major political parties, but by independent farmers' and social groups as well as freelance journalists. Through the power of the internet, what started out as a local incident for dozens of Miaoli farmers soon snowballed into a national issue. This may represent a new pattern for Taiwans social movements.

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On June 9th, the Miaoli County government forcibly took over farmlands, where the rice paddies and fruit were ready for harvest in the coming months.

The news was kept quiet, leaving old farmers helpless.

But citizen journalists broke the blocks and uploaded the first-hand footage online, which became viral on the Internet and infuriates netizens.

Through social networking media outlets such as blogs, Facebook, Plurk and other sites, the incident of the farmers in Dapu of Miaoli has been constantly updated and more farmers' movement and social movement groups as well as scholars join in for the discussion.

The local issue has been elevated onto the national level.

Besides mainstream media outlets, new medias are joining in on reporting, making the information flow much faster and comprehensive.

The demonstration, where farmers slept on the Ketagalan Boulevard, ended in a peaceful and rational fashion, indicating a new social movement model is being made.

However, it still takes time to observe whether such new social movement would receives positive response.

◆ 追蹤更多華視影音及圖文新聞：
1.用Plurk追蹤華視影音及圖文新聞：追蹤
2.用Twitter追蹤華視影音及圖文新聞：追蹤