UPDATE: Winson was found, but unfortunately he’s declined to work together to help make the @taiwan Twitter handle a communication tool for Taiwan’s government.
Also, English version below.
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2006年12月，Twitter才剛開始經營9個月，還沒有很多人使用，一個叫Winson的台灣年輕人就註冊了個帳號，用戶名為@taiwan。
但Winson從來沒有發過任何一個推文、轉發、評論，Winson甚至沒有追蹤任何一個其他帳號。感覺Winson的@taiwan只是Twitter無數幽靈帳號的其中一個。
12年過去了，Twitter現在已經成為主流社群媒體之一，台灣公家機關也開始將Twitter作為對外溝通的工具。
蔡英文有個帳號@iingwen
外交部有個帳號@MOFA_Taiwan
文化部有個帳號@CulturalTaiwan
我在想，如果台灣能有@taiwan這個帳號有多好。所以我很好奇，有人認識Winson嗎？有人見過照片上的這個人嗎？
或許我們可以找到Winson，問問看他是否願意將@taiwan這個用戶名捐出來？
下面這張照片是Winson在Twitter的大頭照。我猜照片中的人就是Winson。
他看起來喜歡戶外活動，他背包旁裝著一個大水壺讓我覺得他非常重視時時補充水分。他看起來挺善良的。
我用Google以圖搜圖的功能，但找不到任何資料。
我在想Winson現在在做什麼？12年過去了，
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順便一提，捐出用戶名是有先例的。
當Twitter剛成立的時候，有一個西班牙人用城市和國家名字，註冊了一堆帳號，之後將帳號陸續捐給這些城市和國家。@canada和@japan就是他捐出來的。如果你有興趣，可以讀這篇華盛頓郵報在2015年做的報導。
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Do you know Winson?
Back in December 2006, just nine months after Twitter launched, a young man named Winson registered the username @taiwan.
Since then, Winson hasn’t tweeted and he’s never followed anyone. It’s pretty much a dead account. He probably thought to himself, “What the hell is this Twitter thing? Hardly anyone is using it.”
But 12 years later, Twitter is now mainstream and the Taiwan government has been using it as a means to reach out to the world.
The president has a personal account: @iingwen
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has an account: @MOFA_Taiwan
The Ministry of Culture also has an account: @CulturalTaiwan
I’m thinking it would be pretty useful for Taiwan to have the @taiwan username. So I’m curious: does anyone know Winson? Does he look familiar at all?
Maybe we can find him and try to get in touch. See if Winson would be okay with donating the account. Or we could all pitch in and buy him a gift or something?
This is the public profile photo on the page. I assume it’s Winson during a backpacking trip.
He looks keen to do some exploring, and sensible about hydration with that huge bottle of water in the side pocket. Seems like a good guy.
I did a reverse Google image search and nothing comes up, sadly.
I wonder what Winson is up to now. It’s been 12 years after all. Has he forgotten he owns the @taiwan account? Is he still backpacking? What’s been happening, Winson? Share with us. Get in touch!
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Donating usernames has been done before, by the way.
A man in Spain was thoughtful enough to donate some country and city usernames he owned to their respective governments. He’s donated both @canada and @japan. You can read about it in this Washington Post article from 2015.