Global Media News

Spotify Finds New Markets in Mexico

Spotify, a global  leader in the music streaming system has now expanded into Mexico.  This move by Spotify is groudbreaking considering Mexico will be the first country in Central America to be introduced to it.

Mexico is one of the leading economies  in Central America. Spotify is hoping that if it becomes popular there, it will lead to expansion to countries all throughout the area.

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), Mexico is the 16th largest digital music market in the world. Since 2008, its digital music market has grown by 17%.BBC.com

Mexico is number 5 in the world for Facebook users.  This can coincide with potential users of the music streaming app and it's future growth in Mexico.  Apparently Apple is about to launch there own verision of the application.  Spotify is hoping that their push into Latin America will continue to make them number one in digital streaming.

Big Controversy over Beer-Flavored Ice Cream in Brazil

                                             

                                                                  photo: The Drinking Business

    What is better than beer and ice cream? How about mixing the two together. Brazil has done just that, but their advertisment for the product has received nothing but critisism. Recently, Ambev, a major Latin American brewery, and the owner, Skol, released an ad on Skol's Facebook page that read "Shall we go to the bar to have an ice cream?" This product does not actually contain any alcohol, but since it looks like a beer can, they have decided that the product should only be sold to people 18 years or older. According to the Times, the sweet snack is currently being sold for a limited time in Rio de Janeiro and  São Paulo.

    What's the problem with this? Well, according to The Huffington Post, Brazil’s National Council for Advertising Self-Regulation (Conar) -- which doesn't have any legal authority -- has ruled that the ice cream promotion could negatively influence children because the Facebook content is not protected with age-limit controls.

    This is not the first time that the company has been warned about promoting controversial products. What did they try and promote? Beer flavored easter eggs! That would be one interesting Easter dinner!

    I understand the controversy behind the advertisment, but the main reason that there has been controversy is due to none other than the internet. Facebook is one way to spread information to as many people in many different countries in a short amount of time. The company can just add in fine print "18 or older to consume". In the United States, many companies advertise on Facebook. Why? Facebook is the easiest way to reach millions of people in many different countries in minutes!

    I do not think that Skol and Ambev's intentions were to negatively impact the children. They wanted to market this product the best way that they could. With that in mind, they made the container look like a famous Skol can. Children in Brazil would not even be able to get their hands on the product, due to it only being sold in a few bars around Brazil.

 

Pablo Escobar Billboards Stirs Anger

Polemic billboards in Columbia sponsored by former vice president and 2014 presidential candidate, Francisco Santos asks viewers, “Guess who killed more policemen. We want peace with no impunity.” The billboard shows portraits of slain drug cartel chief Pablo Escobar and FARC guerilla leader Ivan Marquez.

According to Columbia Reports, a billboard located in Medellin was bombard with tomatoes by an angry group of citizens. The National Electoral Council ordered that the billboard be taken down, but according to Caracol, Santos said, “We will not go down the fences, I am very sorry. Whether we have to go to the constitutional court with a decision of this nature. This is an attack on freedom of expression.”

Santos was willing to withdraw his name from signs that are located in several cities. "There, I will remove the name Francisco Santos and let us follow putting on behalf of the victims," he mentioned in a conversation with Radio Blu. He added: "This is not a matter of Francisco Santos, is a topic of victims ... is a campaign about the victims and not the perpetrators."

Francisco Santos has also been accused of being involved with illegal paramilitary groups according to Columbia Reports. The allegations implicate his involvement in parapolitics that rose since former president Alvaro Uribe presidency. 

It's COLOMBIA not Columbia

Colombians have recently been getting increasingly agrivated with the frequent incorrects spelling of their native country, Colombia. The frustration of the citizens of this country have sparked a media campaign which stresses the importance of the correct spelling of the country.

Although this is a common error and is made by many, Colombians have had enough. According to an article on CNN's website,

"Now, a group of marketing-savvy Colombians, spurred by the government's public relations arm, have launched a social media campaign to set the record straight."

The frequent error has left many Colombians both amused and annoyed.

"Colombia is where famed artist Fernando Botero hails from; Columbia is a university in New York."

Many confuse the spelling, especially in the U.S., due to the Ivy League Universty in Manhattan, Columbia. Colombians want to stress the importance of the spelling in order to emphasize the contributions that Colombia makes to the world, such as their delicious coffee and famous artists.

"A Facebook page for the campaign has been gaining upwards of 1,000 followers a day with a flurry of humorous and creative photos bringing attention to the Colombia/Columbia confusion."

The campaign creates a humorous approach which highlights Colombians' exasperation, yet does not exactly show signs of anger. It's a fun way to get the point across and educate people. Many respond well to humor, not anger, and this approach is sure to catch the eye of many.

The facebook page is a great idea because of the influence that media has on society. It will be hard to ignore the page, and news of the campaign and the page is sure to spread quickly. Soon, not many will be making the same spelling error.

The campaign's intent is not only to correct the silly spelling error, but to also promote what Colombia has to offer to the rest of the world. The founders of the campaign hope to promote tourism and investment that will help boost their economy.

"The campaign is lighthearted, but has a serious mission behind it -- to use the spelling lesson as a door for people to reacquaint themselves with modern Colombia. Organizers hope the effort eventually will parlay into real economic opportunities, be it through tourism or foreign investment."

Some Colombians are concerned that many people get the wrong impression of Colombia, probably due to it's reputation in the drug industry. Aside from that, Colombia is really only well known for it's coffee.

Carlos Pardo, a vice president of Colombia-based Zemoga, a digital services company with many U.S. clients has said,

"People outside of Colombia, especially in the United States, have a wrong impression of what Colombia is."

The campaign aims to end this false impression and give people a better and more positive understanding of what Colombia can produce and offer to the rest of the world.

According to an important media forum in Latin America, NBCLatino,

"“We saw this common error and realized it was a platform to start updating the world’s vision of what is happening in our country,” says Emilio Pombo, one of four founders of the “It’s Colombia, NOT Columbia” social media campaign. “We currently have great things happening. Colombia is becoming a destination and getting on the world stage. We want to spotlight that and it all starts with people spelling our country’s name right.”

The Washington Post emphasizes the use of several internet media outlets, especially Twitter, that help to promote this campaign. Tweets such as the one below help to humorize the situation and spread the word.

@shakira‘s hips are from Colombia, not from Columbia! #itscolombianotColumbia on.fb.me/UHKMjV twitter.com/OdeColombia/st…

— Colombia (@OdeColombia) February 12, 2013

(CNN.com, "It's Colombia, not Columbia," http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/20/world/americas/colombia-not-columbia)

Violence Against Brazilian Press Increasing

On Friday March 8th, Rodrigo Neto was killed by two gunman while walking to his car.  Mr. Neto hosted a radio show and wrote a column for a Brazilian paper, Ipatinga daily ale do Aco.

 

As reported in The Rio Times  "The crime against journalist .Rodrigo Neto had the characteristic of an execution.  It was an attack on life, human rights and freedom of expression."   RodrigoNeto was a reporter of crime and local corruption. 

  According to Carlos Muller, a spokesman for the NAN  (National Assoication of Newspapers) the majority of recent cases in Brazil are related to local issues usually involving organized crime.  Sometime in connection with corrupt police and local politicians. 

 Neto was the fourth journalist killed so far this year.  But it appears that this killing spree has not been investigated.   The murders that have been investigated did not end in convictions either.  This has created a culture of impunity that means corrupt individuals see little risk in paying a hired gunman to silence a reporter asking inconvenient questions. What all these cases have in common is a lack of investigation. 

In a report from RJI, Brazil was listed as one of the most dangerous place's to work.   While many reporters are losing their lives while investigating corruption.  Is the corruption being with  local police? The same police who, once the reporter has been shot , are responsible for investigating the murder. 

How could anyone expect  a fair investigation by someone you may have been reporting on for ther corrupt practices? Is their a link between organized crime and the police?  Is the media at risk in this conspiracy? 

 

Brazilian Google Senior Executive Arrested Over a Video?

In late September 2012 one of Google's Senior Executive board members Fabio Jose Silva Coelho was arrested for failing to take down a YouTube video that puts a negative image on a local mayoral candidate. YouTube has agreements with the different countries they operate in because laws was broken justice had to be served. 

The Rio Times reports:

"Police in Brazil have released the country’s top Google executive following his detention for not taking down Youtube clips that violated Brazilian law. Brazil has strict electoral laws that prevent much public criticism of political candidates, a system that some commentators say are out-dated."

Freedom of information took a turn of the worst in Brazil when a Google's senior executive Mr. Coelho is arrested for refusing to take down the video of a political candidate. To make things worst Google owns YouTube so to see a Google employee arrested for  expressing himself and Google not supporting them is really a sad sight.

The New York Times reports:

"An elections court in Brazil has ordered the arrest of Google’s most senior executive in the country after the company failed to take downYouTube videos attacking a local mayoral candidate. Google is appealing the order, which comes after a similar decision by another Brazilian elections judge. In that case, a judge found a different senior executive responsible for violating local election law.An elections court in Brazil has ordered the arrest of Google’s most senior executive in the country after the company failed to take downYouTube videos attacking a local mayoral candidate. "

This is understandable because it puts a negative view on the candidate and could possible change undecided voters minds. Freedom of information has a bigger restriction. Social media is a big part of society and thanks to this people are able to share their feelings about the world around them including politics.

 

Missing reporters: Not the End of the Story

Just like El Salvador, Mexico has its fair share of violence in the country. It has been rated time and again as one of the most dangerous countries in the world. Gangs and corrupt governments control the cities and most people live in poverty. The violence has since trickeled into the media and has begun to target journalists.

"Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in 2011 described Mexico as "one of the hemisphere's most dangerous countries" for the media. Since 2000, scores of journalists have been murdered. "Drug cartels and corrupt officials are implicated in most of the crimes of violence against journalists, which almost always go unpunished," RSF added."BBC World Profile

Veracruz has been in the limelight as of late because of the amount of reporters who have either been killed, kidnapped or threatened by the government or by gang members.  Apparently the Mexican government has been doing nothing to investigate these issues. It becomes pretty obvious in these situations that the local authorities uninterest is most likely due to their involvement to some degree. The Latin American Herald reports

"Mexican authorities said at a forum that drug-trafficking gangs pay around 1.27 billion pesos (some $100 million) a month in bribes to municipal police officers nationwide"

It is really no wonder at that rate that local authorities would find no interest in looking into the dissapearance of a few journalists when the people who pay them are involved.  Sergio Landa Rosado was kidnapped by unidentified men who claimed that an article he wrote about a murdered cab driver was the kind of information that might bring too much attention to it, reported the Committee to Protect Journalists. The CPJ have been urging Mexican authorities to investigate the kidnapping and help to find Landa and the people behind this. So far Mexico has been uncooperative.

"Veracruz has become the most dangerous state for journalists in Mexico, according to CPJ research. Last week, the national Mexican magazine Proceso reported that it has learned of a plot by officials in the government of Veracruz to harm journalist Jorge Carrasco, who has reported extensively on the murder of the magazine's correspondent in that state, Regina Martínez Pérez. At least eight journalists have been murdered since Gov. Javier Duarte took office in late 2010, and many more have fled--permanently or temporarily--because of threats from organized crime as well as from state government officials, according to CPJ research." CPJ

How are these foreign press agencies going to get Mexico to budge on this? It seems nearly impossible to make a change. The issues are repetitive and seem to go ignored time and again. There needs to be a serious crackdown on the authorities and how the country is run but who is going to be able to pull that off? And is it even possible for such an over haul to take place? It would most certainly take years to change the way Mexico is run so what is everyone to do until then?

 

 

Argentina and the Battle Over Media Laws

The Argentinian government has been waging a war on one specific media company: Grupo Clarin. According to an ABC News article, the battle between Argentina's president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, and the media conglomerate has been ongoing for years. Just a few days ago, a federal appeals court declared a 2009 media law unconstitutional (a ruling which favors the media group Grupo Clarin) and "now Fernández is aiming for a Supreme Court showdown with the media conglomerate."

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, "Mrs. Kirchner has put an enormous amount of political capital into trying to undo Clarin, which she accuses of trying to bring down her government through biased reporting. Clarin officials have long argued the law is a ruse to silence independent media companies that publish information and opinions critical of the government."

While the battle rages in the courts, Argentinians took to the streets last Thursday. Over a million Argentinians protested the government and the president's reform of the media laws. According to one University student quoted in a Reuters article by Brian Winter and Jorge Otaola, "I took to the street because we live in a democracy that runs the risk of transforming into authoritarianism."

Anti-monopoly laws should be a good thing, but when wielded by politicians convinced the media is biased against them? Perhaps the big business is the only one big enough to stand up to that. In a country with one overwhelming media giant, is breaking that company up really the solution? Smaller companies are not always run successfully and this particular media giant seems to be on the right side of the law. The decision rests with the supreme court which, according to the Wall Street Journal, "has been loath to hear the case given the pressure it will face to rule in Mrs. Kirchner's favor." Hopefully justice, and not political pressure, will prevail.

Spotify Now Available In Mexico

The online music service Spotify is now available in Mexico! Spotify, is a music streaming service which is free of charge to use, unless you want to pay a monthly fee to have premium content, for instance no ads,  and better quality songs. According to Tech Crunch, Spotify has a base of 24 million customers around the world, only of which 6 million use the service consistently month to month.

According to the LA Times, Mexico isn't the only new country that Spotify is available in. It is now also available in many different countries in Asia. Such as Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaysia.

 

Mexico is an up-coming nation in the Social network and media world. According to SocialBakers an internet statistics website, Facebook in Mexico currently have around 42 million, monthly users. That is ranked 5th in the world.  The breakdown of social networking in Mexico is 39%  of citizens use Facebook, 38% use Youtube and 20% use Twitter. I think these numbers will continue to grow, because Mexico has some areas that are extremely poor so not everyone can afford to use the internet, but these numbers have improved in the past few years. So hopefully internet users in Mexico will keep increasing so they can continue to grow in the internet world.

New Argentinean TV Drama Tells Story Of Fallen Soldiers

Argentina: A group of film makers have made history by setting out to film the stories of the soldiers in the Falklands War. The film makers, Tomás de las Heras and Jeronimo Paz Clemente, have certainly made waves with this film, creating something new people have never seen before. Many have praised the film as daring, while other seem to think it is causing tension.

    The TV series, Combatientes, was made to show the heroism and strife of the soldiers who fought in the Falklands War. Where other documentaries and movies have showed showed just the dispute and the war itself, the film makers decided to go a different route. De Las Heras and Clemente centered the film around the soldiers struggle. The wanted to make the film about them, their struggle with hunger and their heroism during the war. In an article by Roberta Radu, on guardian.co.uk, director Tomás de las Heras had this to say about the plot of Combatientes, 

    "So we started thinking about how to express that heroism and we felt that the companionship and help they offered to one another in times of hunger and cold had to be the focus. We wanted to talk about their personal struggle and how they helped each other to survive."

    The TV series, which cost around $200,000 to make, was widely praised but at the same time caused mild political tensions. The series caused tensions between Britain and Argentina, but not enough to stop them. It was recently reported, that the film had caused massive source of controversy between Britain and Argentiana. Naturally, because it was a subject of war, they rejected the docu-drama from the start. That did nothing to stop the film makers however.

    Although there have been other documentaries, books and films, this is the first series and has been widely praised. It took a long time to produce but many say it was worth it. This film speaks levels about the nation of Argentina. Argentina is a nation rich in culture and documentary. This just adds to the list. Arginta is home to famous film festivals and famous first such as these directors. Combatientes will just add to the long list of accomplishments. Argentina has been known to censor certain media outlets, but this is a defiant win for the industry. 

PICTURE: Offical poster of the TV series. Depicts the Flaklands soilders as well as the name of the series. Provided by Combatientes La Serie and Facebook.com