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A look at the dark side of the media. Interview with Francisco Vidal Bonifaz


A look at the dark side of media
Interview with Francisco Vidal Bonifaz *



Ariel Ruiz Mondragón today no doubt the great power that large companies accumulate concentrated ownership and control of the media at global, regional and national levels. His power as well as economic, is also clearly evident in the politics and culture, among other areas.

The Mexican case is no exception: a group of large companies, led by an even smaller group of families, are holding the mainstream media makers to produce and disseminate information and entertainment, especially television, radio and the press-with which they get huge profits and extraordinary political influence, which still have many outstanding on legislation.

One of the least known aspects of the media in Mexico is his business, which is maintained in opacity by the companies themselves so to suit their interests. It is still very contradictory that through means such enterprises require transparency while keeping their finances in almost total secrecy.

was recently published one of the few books that have been peer into the backings of the Mexican media economy: The owners of the fourth (Mexico, Planeta, 2008), by Francisco Vidal Bonifaz, who is mapping media and provides data to understand the present and glimpse the future of Mexican consortium of communication in the country and internationally.

on several topics covered in the book spoke with the author: the difficulties of its investigation, the lack of studies on the topic, the economic weight of media groups, the transnationalization of the activity, the media companies' relationships with the power policy and the role of public media. Furthermore, the desirable and possible diversity of content, the situation of democracy to newspapers and media concentration. Vidal Bonifaz

studied Economics at the UNAM, and has worked in various publications: El Financiero, Financial Infosel , Reform, Millennium , Excelsior so and , among others. Currently a private consultant.

Ariel Ruiz (AR): Why write a book like yours?

Francisco Vidal (FV): After working more or less daily 15 years in the media, and teaching, I have the idea that the boys who come to the media do very little objective ideas of what are the media. I studied economics, and I think the opportunity to contribute something to the formation of the boys was talking about the economics of media.

This is actually the fourth owners power: economic power and ownership media, which is the big issue. I want to thank

Replicante the interview, as well as Metro has been encouraged to publish the book, nor is the eighth wonder, always tell them that for me is like taking a map of the media from the point of view economic.

AR: What were the main difficulties faced in conducting this research? At the beginning of the book mentions the lack of data, lack of information, among other things. Did you ask for data to the companies of which you speak?

FV: It is very difficult because no information, it is highly segmented, highly fragmented and piecemeal, then is sometimes unhelpful. Most times, if you see the book, it is supported by hard data in reports. I leaned a lot on information from the companies that by their nature have to be public, especially those traded stocks or securities, which are low: we are talking about Televisa, TV Azteca, Radio Centro, Cablemas, ICD-OCESA and now.

No, not asked for anything. Although sometimes I do: I wanted to have the historical sequence of things, and curiosity to a newspaper circulating in Tijuana, I asked the details of your foundation, and it is time that I return or mail.

worked in the media, where we are still spoiled opacity, and this makes things difficult. But you can do work, much information. In fact, as saying a person I appreciate a lot and taught me how to report a bit, it's more important what is omitted than what it gets. Then there are many things that were omitted, but information is there, it is difficult to systematize.

round off, I think it is necessary that the means to open their information to the public.

AE: Why had so far been little studied this "dark side of the media" as you call it to his business?

FV: I do not know. I think there is one condition: that most studies Media make-or-do journalists. But the numbers do not give us much. At least I have ten years of teaching a subject that speaks volumes about Statistics applied to journalism, and the conclusion I get is that the numbers do not give us much.

economists may not have given much attention.

There is a third factor: I think there is fear. It's really interesting when you take the book to a person who has been in the world of communication in these years, he said, "Well, realize that you no longer have jobs." I said, "In the media? I hope you do have. "

know that there are many ways in which There are high opacity, who do not like giving information, and there are others who, although they have to give the information because they are public, not even given complete.

AR: You mentioned at the beginning of the book the importance of the media industry in the national economy, which is rather modest. Does this happen in other countries, or the Mexican is a particular case? In the American case, what economic weight have their big media groups?

FV: There it is much more developed. What happens is that the U.S. case is separate: it is brutal expansion with entertainment groups, its ramifications, formats, is an awesome thing.

We have always believed, we are told that we have a media industry and entertainment very powerful, especially television. At the conclusion I reached is that, yes, but not much, at least on the world stage.

AR: Not at the national level?

FV: No, not so much, to some extent is reasonable. It need not be the oil, or directly. But what has always told us was that we had a very significant level, at least, by English media, but even that, the first English-language media company in the world is not Mexican, but English, is Prisa.

Unfortunately I think it has done so much damage that there is not much competition, no more options, because that has made the media industry in Mexico has rested on its laurels.

AR: It is also a protected industry.

FV: But of course, in every way. I think one of the missing of the book is how the public budget will actually reach the media industry and how these revenues represent.

industry is protected, to some extent maybe it has to be. But that does not mean that, on the other hand, there is no stimulus for development, for diversification, so that more options, so that magazines like replicator or any other has more space, more funding, greater readership. We are too concentrated in too few options of both companies and formats: the queen is here Televisa and TV format is key.

AR: In the first chapter of the book notes that worldwide there are five large media groups, and some others where you call the "division of promotion," including Prisa. What weight estimated to have these international giants in the Mexican media industry? There are outlined some data.

FV: I do not give in the book because it is very difficult. In any case it is not so great for our market ellos, esa es la verdad; no quiere decir que no sea relevante en términos regionales, porque finalmente tenemos la población que habla español más grande en el planeta. Pero para los grandes consorcios los principales mercados no están en América Latina, sino en Estados Unidos, Asia y Europa. Eso está clarísimo.
América Latina es un mercado y una región secundaria. Calculo, en un atrevimiento muy grande, que tal vez tengan el 30 por ciento del mercado de medios nacionales y extranjeros. Pero es muy difícil de estimar; por dar un ejemplo: la televisión abierta, que llega al 98 por ciento de los hogares. Vamos a hablar de los canales nacionales que hay: en el Canal 7, de TV Azteca, prácticamente all content is abroad, is a movie channel and series. Channel 5 is there. Then two of the six major channels are already dominated by foreigners. Only at that level and would be giving an account more or less than 30 percent who gave him.

In radio is much less, because you recently had a brutal expansion of English music. The main radio media product is not news-of any means, of course-but the music. The vast majority of production is of Mexican music, but the producers are EMI, Sony, BMG, etc., which are foreign. Then the braces are Mexican-owned, but the content is from outside.

Where it is clear that most markedly more domestic production is in print.

AR: On the other hand, mentions some data from Mexican firms to invest abroad, especially in cases of Televisa and TV Azteca. Towards the outside, what happened to these companies?

FV: That's very interesting. The investigation had to stop at some point, in 2006 I stopped, but here this year has worsened much the range of the internationalization of the Mexican media. This is inevitable: they have to grow out.

and outlines what is the creation of the U.S. market content in English, which definitely will be Mexico, the United States and Canada, there's no doubt. I tell my students that information has legs and, not knowing when we are already where you do not know, so are the media content. Then

Televisa and TV Azteca will have to break the soul to try to have an important place in this market. Azteca is very clear, trying to boost its production, marketing and channel operation in the community of English speakers in America.

Televisa has the problem of the big fight he had with Univision, but there is still a multiyear contract by the you have to sell their produce to Univision, and this is the must buy. But you can get back, see it difficult for her. This also explains that Televisa is getting to telecommunications.

Internationalization also responds to a process where broadcast television, which has been an endless source of money in this country, when one has met 98 percent of television households, and higher ratings are 30 for percent where there are very good novels, you already encountered.

who have come across the television, and now come the U.S. networks to compete with content in English is an incentive for Mexican companies have to internationalize. Neither more nor less than this year returned to Central TV Azteca, and before I had something in Guatemala, sold and bought back now. Televisa was long in Chile, also TV Azteca, "I think Peru entered sometime. Total, will have to go back, to build partnerships. My big question is the market in Spain, where I think it will be very difficult, although Televisa is already a shareholder of one of the five new channels that were enabled in that country with the opening of the television, which is called La Sexta.
have to grow out there, what will be their fate, do not know.

AR: I recently Emilio Azcarraga Jean said something like that gave him nothing Televisa Mexican politicians, implying that the firm was itself no favors from the government. You mention in the book that had policies to favor that company, and also notes the case of Ricardo Salinas Pliego and his ties to Raul Salinas when it acquired Imevisión. "Roughly, how was the connection between political and media companies in Mexico?

FV: Well, at least in the case of the relation has been television cord. Born as Telesistema Mexican Televisa, and there were three main groups: O'Farril, the Azcarraga and the family of President Miguel German. If Mr. Azcarraga Jean thinks that owes nothing to the government, I think that is fine, but there are historical facts. That is irrefutable.

Mr. Salinas Pliego (to see if he sues us because he loves it) admitted that Raul Salinas de Gortari had lent him money to make the television in a contest that was held under the mandate of the brother who lent him money.
There is nothing worse than denying the facts. If there are other implications, and an investigation is opened to display. I have no more items, I do know is what everyone knows, because it is published constantly: that the public budget is also of some importance to media revenues. Well maybe should be, I do not say no, not about favors, but also to say "I salute the government nor" because it is not true.

may not be absolutely certain that the government would not survive without these companies, but it is true that without the government would survive.
Then the umbilical connection is, bring it from birth. And there is something that has always happened in Mexico, and is a bit complex, which is that there is little clarity in the granting of concessions.

AR: In radio there are large groups that dominate the industry in the country. Given the overwhelming dominance of private television and radio, what sense takes the public sector in the media industry? There are concessions that were granted to state governments, universities, etc.. Should there be a project about to make another kind of television, radio, communication?

FV: First of all, my respect for workers in the public media, because they do wonders with meager budgets. That's a brutal disregard the professional work of those who give their lives for the media, of course, have to regulate it, would be watched, you have decent working conditions. I think it would be best. The

public media are very important, first because it should be the spearhead of a cultural policy of the state as a whole, as an investment. Maybe you can not force Televisa to provide information in Nahuatl, but some public media could do "in the book are mentioned in the indigenous language radio stations.

are also important because they are a necessary counterweight to the excessive commercialization. I'm not saying do not do private companies to do their job well, but sometimes it happens the hand.

Public media should now have very clear plans supported by a strategy and policy at State level for want. They should also have the best technology-for example, public media should be passing a digital television and public radio stations to digital transmitters.

would have to rethink what to do with the print media and public budgets, so there is diversity.

AR: On the contents, the largest audience with the telenovelas and foreign films, and eventually slips a football game. What chance is there for greater thematic diversity, which could be competitive before those traditional niches?

FV: there are always possibilities because there is much room for creativity in the youth, in people. The matter which I'm not so sure that there's the conditions to develop, especially wills.

The next pattern we are going to crown the series. Which we have now 35 years old and upward, we telenovelas, series and soccer. The guys are not going to watch TV, you will be given back because they are not interested in the history of the Cinderella theme in soap operas, because they see other things in your everyday life.

If I want a bit provocative, I bet you do not even try to bring down both the television schedules, but rather to invite the developers to do things outside the scope of the small screen. I think now a huge opportunity is the Internet, even to produce television, there need not grant or permit. There are networks available, we are seeing the phenomenon of the emergence of themes, movies and short films from the network.

will not be easy, but in any case, that in the public media, if you make it to have a global approach to public policy, it will cost us time.
What in any case is worrying is that there consume little news-media accountability should be noted.

Radio, as it is for music. In the book I put the list of news and information services there, and can not be that so many; There is an enormous fragmentation.

What we lack are studying the habits of youth, studies that are public and known, because maybe we are wasting a huge mine, because ultimately they are the future of media. You have to see where they go.

I think television has a point of departure. Television, 98 percent coverage, pay television, and 25 percent do not think I can reach 100 by country income levels. "That brings more audience, or make the one in the open channels to stay there, and allocate their time in pay? I do not think there is a large opening for rehearing, because 98 percent already, preference only moved from one place to another.

regards radio, we know what time it is used, there are many studies. But kids with iPods, with all these wireless systems, with the network, are in a different world, and that's where they could attack with public policies that would lead the public media with information, entertainment, good things to them, without moralizing, trying to understand how are the kids. For there, forget the TV better.

AR: As for newspapers: how to look at the future of newspapers? You give figures for the stagnation in their runs for more than 10 years, during the who has not reached a print run of 1994. Mentioned below free newspapers, which seem to grow. What does the future have in these conditions?

FV: Too complicated, not only in Mexico but that happens all over the world. The big problem for us is coming down the circulation, which was never great. We read a few newspapers, because I believe that journalists will continue to talk to the leaders, decision makers and ordinary people we lost confidence.

I do not know if at this point is hopeless. Actually I'm not optimistic in that sense, the trend will continue.

In any case I do not know the extent to which come free to replace those readers who are already reading newspapers. I've been checking the figures for 2007 and so far in 2008, and continue to fall. I think the trend will always be to fall 1 or 2 percent each year.

The free what they will do is say "well, if you do not want to pay 10 pesos no problem, but I'm here." Then only going to make a switch , for example, I know there are free in a very successful Guadalajara, "in Mexico City two and one in Hidalgo. Calculation have to walk the 300 or 400 thousand copies. It's a lot. I think the road is going to go there.

On the other hand, I think the print media is what has always been, as I said sometimes Raymundo Riva Palacio, the conduit through which the powerful speak for themselves and each other.

Now, let us journalists who seek to change that. Why not open the court? No open issues, not people you talk to your concerns, and then beaten up trying to sell the stories that do not work. The public is not stupid, you may miss if you want culture, and that's debatable, criteria or information, but not stupid. I always tell my students: Why sell 750 000 copies of TV Notes every week-that, say, is perhaps the run of the week a national newspaper "? And all everyone says that this information is garbage. I do not know whether it is or not, but to me as an information professional should I be concerned and try to understand what code, what languages, what approaches are reaching the people. You have to understand what is happening in the auditorium.

AR: Internet would not be a way for newspapers?

FV: But it will take, in entering the population. But I think the Internet is the future. In fact, I think newspapers should have read more online than in print.

However, if the information is being handled as in the print media, they're going to leave, because people does not understand, basically do not understand because they are so encoded. By giving an example: I think we're the country that should have more columns in newspapers per square centimeter. The information is usually encoded columnist-not going to say whether good or bad, that is another matter, "because that is their field of work: the codes of communication between a source and another. That is what gives meaning to the columnist. Most are columns that carry strategic information from a sender to a specific receptor, and this is done through codes. That's good for the transmitter and the receiver, and the columnist does its job of moving a message, nothing more that 99.9 percent of the other readers or do not understand or imagine what they read.

While this model forward, ever going to understand unless things: what we read something and then not understand? The media has many problems, and by extension are misspelled. Then our product has gone down in quality, has fallen to level of understanding. If this scheme we reproduce on the internet, will go through exactly the same.

AR: Robert Dahl said that a condition for democracy is that there must be various information sources. As can be seen in the first chapter of his book, there are five big companies-plus a few others that come behind them-that global dominate the world of information and entertainment. At the international level and in Mexico, as you say, the trend is a monopoly. What effect will this economic trend in the future of democracy, particularly in Mexico?

FV: Well, the result is obvious: the interpretations are going to be very few sources, and our interpretive framework will always be governed by it. Moreover, I can assure you that even removing the sources of such companies in Mexico, we have highly concentrated power. If you get to analyze what our sources of information, I assure you the basics of all citizens are twofold. That's dangerous.

Moreover, it seems inevitable because the consortia have to grow, if they do, they die or are killed. That does not turn. I learned in school that competition in a market economy leads to monopoly, not vice versa. It's what I learned and what I'm seeing.

is very difficult to talk about democracy. In contrast, I think all we can do is that citizens and governments to deliver us to organize and share information. There will be a dangerous madman who believes in journalism, open, pluralistic, balanced and providing information to citizens.

should be seen not to be absolutize things, because all too this depends on certain behaviors. For example, it is clear that the information in the United States is concentrated in too few hands. About the war in Iraq, always mention the serious role that the chain was News Corp, which is Rupert Murdoch. But nevertheless, there are certain ethical standards that still serve as a counterweight, and now can be denouncing such abuses. It also happens that in Europe.

I think what we have to think, then, in the ability to access more diverse. I would love to have pay TV, for example, the channel of Cuba. Why not bring the channel of the South American governments, Telesur? Why not promote the possibility of more windows for more views? Finally, the citizen is the one who decides. And so we turn to the media is to provide information for decision making.

going to be inevitable that consortia continue to grow and make mergers that closed the book here has been three or four very great, and will continue. If we put a counter, create options from the point of view of governments, as state policies, not like that happens to every ruler, potential citizens, and open up new youth projects.


* Interview published in Replicante No. 16, August-October 2008. Reproduced with permission of the publisher.