Why is News & News Talk So Popular in Mexico?

[Gregg]

In a separate thread, Fred Cantu tells us there are 3 all-news FMs in Mexico City and David Eduardo adds that AM 790 is also all-news.

Amazing considering only NY and LA have two all-news stations in the U.S. Most U.S. cities have one or none. There are only about a dozen all-news stations in the U.S. and three in Canada.

Unless we're stretching the definition of all-news? Are the Mexico City all-news stations like those in the U.S.? Brief world and local stories repeated frequently, traffic and weather every ten minutes, quick sports and business updates every half-hour? Or are we talking about something more like "All Things Considered"?

And is the newsgathering business totally free? I can remember seeing Channel 12 Tijuana news in the early 90s. Then as now, they do an hour of news at 6 and 10pm. But it was all happy news when I was vacationing in San Diego at the time. If you only watched XEWT news, you'd think Tijuana had no murders, no fires, no strikes, no gangs, no robberies.

The only news that ever happened in Tijuana was men in suits holding meetings and ribbon-cuttings. A new government office opens, a new bus route starts, a meeting to discuss something important is held. And no members of the public were ever interviewed. A Channel 12 news crew covering something about schools would interview a government education official. They'd be at a school and have video of parents bringing their kids to class but never talk to a parent, a teacher or a student. One day the San Diego TV stations were covering a leak from a Tijuana sewage plant that was flowing over into San Diego but XEWT never covered that story.

There was only one bad news story I can remember. Police had shot dead an alleged cop-killer. We saw several minutes of video of the dead body, viewed from several angles. No cloth covering his face or torso. The happy news policy went out the window with that story. Meanwhile in the U.S., dead bodies, even those of bad guys, are only shown at a distance for a few seconds.

I often wondered, if a Channel 12 news crew were en route to a ribbon-cutting and they had to detour around a big fire, would they stop and shoot the fire, or would they rush to the ribbon-cutting.

I suppose news coverage in Mexico is freer today, with the break of one party holding most of the power. But why is talk and news so popular as radio formats... especially since in the U.S., they skew pretty old, while Mexico's population is younger than that of the U.S.?



Gregg
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[fredcantu]

But why is talk and news so popular as radio formats... especially since in the U.S., they skew pretty old, while Mexico's population is younger than that of the U.S.?

Generally speaking I think Mexicans have a healthier appetite for news than Americans. Even pop and rock stations carry news. Sadly we've weaned our listeners off news since de-reg.

News stations in Mexico are popular because they stand up for the little guy. Crooked cops, shady business dealings and corrupt officials make for great radio. And they turn courageous newscasters into local heroes. And in the big cities there are plenty of crimes, government dealings, business news and of course traffic and weather to report.

The populist attitude also gives the news stations an anti-establishment attitude that's popular with young people. So it's not a bland diet of news coming out the radio. It's life in the big city and you're in the middle of it and the newscasters ''got your back.'' Wouldn't you listen?

 

[davideduardo]

Unless we're stretching the definition of all-news? Are the Mexico City all-news stations like those in the U.S.? Brief world and local stories repeated frequently, traffic and weather every ten minutes, quick sports and business updates every half-hour? Or are we talking about something more like "All Things Considered"?

790 is like a US all news station... a repeating cycle of news items. The FMs are a bit more magazine style.

But remember that all-news was invented in Latin America... Reloj Nacional in Cuba in 1948... more than a decade before it came to the US via XETRA, Tijuana, "Extra News over Los Angeles." One of the reasons why news on the radio was popular had to do with the low literacy rates... radio was the newspaper for many. In fact, a newscast was often called a "radioperiódico" or "radionewspaper."

Mexico City and several other big cities had a station that only gave time checks... because most people could not afford watches.

I suppose news coverage in Mexico is freer today, with the break of one party holding most of the power. But why is talk and news so popular as radio formats... especially since in the U.S., they skew pretty old, while Mexico's population is younger than that of the U.S.?

Mexico City has around a dozen talk stations, too. Talk is profitable because the audience is mostly A, B and C+ socioeconomic class, the segments that have more consumer spendable income than C, C-, D and E levels. Low ratings are made up for by higher income levels.

In Buenos Aires, Argentina, all 13 or 14 fulltime, full power AMs are news/talk or sports. Several of them are in the top 5 stations, and the leader has around 50 on its news staff... and the morning news magazine has 7 anchors and a staff humorist who writes daily comical commentary on news items.

 

[elchupacabras]

I suppose news coverage in Mexico is freer today, with the break of one party holding most of the power.

To a certain degree yes, but due to election law/constitutional reforms in the past couple of years, the IFE, Instituto Federal Electoral, aggressively sanctions stations and/or journalists who openly criticize elected officials, especially in the time frame around an election. This caused somewhat of an initial backlash from many in the industry, including Pedro Ferrís de Con (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK39SP0YKA0) and others. Ferrís continues to criticize the government over this issue, but is careful to not go after any particular leader, but instead hits hard against IFE. IFE has even tried to sanction the Catholic Church for comments it made a few days ago encouraging Mexican Catholics to not vote for parties which support abortion. Fortunately, it looks like the Mexican government will not pursue the issue. http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/586930.html IFE also requires ALL stations in the country to air its insipid spots alerting everyone that "Mexico is a democracy," and that the "elections are coming in July!" We're talking a mandatory compliance of 24+ minutes of inventory a day, or face massive fines, such as were recently assessed against several of Mexico's top TV 'casters. (Pedro cited a study this morning showing that the average Mexican, listening less than a couple hours a day since January has heard a minimum of 500 of these spots!)

Expanding upon Fred and David's comments, I would also add to radio is the PRIMARY news medium for Mexico and Latin America. Newspaper subscriptions, even in their heydays, never matched those of the U.S. Mexico City has a respectable number of dailies, but if you go into the interior of the country, newspaper is a very minimal player, with the exception of the B+ economic classes.

In small market and medium market cities, there are many FM's which abandon the idea of a "traditional" morning show (as per U.S. ideals), and spend 3-4 hours on news and commentary. They then segue into regular music formats.

All in all, Mexico does have a huge appetite for news, especially 6-10AM and 2-4 PM (hora de la comida).

David a question for you, you mentioned Argentine AM's. Who's number one these days? Mitre? Rivadavia? Continental? And on the FM, just out of curiosity, how do the specialty stations such as FM 2X4 (tango) do? I'd guess tango is dying a 55+ death in the country ratings wise.

 

[davideduardo]

David a question for you, you mentioned Argentine AM's. Who's number one these days? Mitre? Rivadavia? Continental? And on the FM, just out of curiosity, how do the specialty stations such as FM 2X4 (tango) do? I'd guess tango is dying a 55+ death in the country ratings wise.

Radio 10, Mega 98.3's sister AM, is #1 and has been for about 12 or 13 years since it went on the air; it's the only 100 kw AM in Bs. As. now, and leads with almost 2 to 1 margins. Mitre and Continete follow, and Rivadavia is all sports.

2 x 4 is at the bunch of little stations at the bottom, sometimes appearing in "others."

 

[Huff]

David a question for you, you mentioned Argentine AM's. Who's number one these days? Mitre? Rivadavia? Continental? And on the FM, just out of curiosity, how do the specialty stations such as FM 2X4 (tango) do? I'd guess tango is dying a 55+ death in the country ratings wise.

Radio 10, Mega 98.3's sister AM, is #1 and has been for about 12 or 13 years since it went on the air; it's the only 100 kw AM in Bs. As. now, and leads with almost 2 to 1 margins. Mitre and Continete follow, and Rivadavia is all sports.

2 x 4 is at the bunch of little stations at the bottom, sometimes appearing in "others."

Confirming David's observations, you can find the latest topline ratings for Buenos Aires here:
http://www.ibope.com.ar/consultas/radio_gba.htm

Mind you with IBOPE, shares are exclusive to each band (eg. Radio 10's 37.17 share is its share of listening on the AM band, not its share of listening overall.)

On the FM side, Vale has made an impressive ascent over the last several months, taking the top spot from the usual two contenders, Mega and Rock & Pop.

 

[fredcantu]

The specifics don't mean much to those us unfamiliar with Buenos Aires radio. Maybe we should stick with Mexico.

 

[mjlarochelle]

I was in Mexico for almost four weeks and at least the Mexican family I spent time with seemed to use the TV as their primary news source, usually the 2:30 news on XEW-2 (which features a woman anchor who has a pink rose on her desk, a longtime tradition I'm told) and the prime time news on XEQ-9, as well as a local cable channel with a public access type local news program. They rarely read newspapers and if they listened to the radio it was a music station on FM.

 

[elchupacabras]

I was in Mexico for almost four weeks and at least the Mexican family I spent time with seemed to use the TV as their primary news source, usually the 2:30 news on XEW-2 (which features a woman anchor who has a pink rose on her desk, a longtime tradition I'm told) and the prime time news on XEQ-9, as well as a local cable channel with a public access type local news program. They rarely read newspapers and if they listened to the radio it was a music station on FM.

Lolita Ayala is the name of the anchor.

 

[RadioFixerCLE]

Lolita Ayala is the name of the anchor.

Didn't she do TV news in the USA back in the 80s? On SIN and then Univision, I thought.....