HispanicTrending

Democratizing Technology To Enhance People’s Lives Around The World

April 1, 2008

My good frien Gabriel Biguria has recently started a new blog, AmigoLatino Connections (http://amigoblogs.com/), where he covers relevant information about the companies, individuals, and the technological solutions that aore helping to address major needs in under-served markets.

The blog is an extension of his business, Amigo Latino (www.amigolatino.com), which democratizes access to communications and ecommerce channels. Their Amigo Live channel, connects distant families face-to-face in real-time and at a low cost between the US and Latin America (its like affordable Telepresence for families).

Check it out… it’s pretty cool technology.

February 29, 2008
By Marisa Treviño

Since 2004, I have been offering online analysis on politics and issues that uniquely affect the Latino community. Now, for the first time, Hispanic bloggers like me are being ushered into the world of presidential politics — and given a front-row seat.

With the race for the White House narrowing and the Latino vote finally realizing its potential, Latino political bloggers have suddenly been flushed from the fringes of the blogosphere while being courted by the campaigns.

In Tuesday’s primary in Texas, Hispanic voters are expected to account for almost 40% of the turnout, easily enough to swing the contest one way or another. The presidential campaigns believe we bloggers can help sway Latino opinion, accurately interpret the pulse of the community and even give the campaigns a sense of how the electorate will vote.

Traffic on my blog, though quite modest when compared with mainstream blogs such as The Huffington Post, has ramped up since the campaign began — a reflection of the historic interest in a contest that has also seen record voter turnout in primaries and caucuses. A good month for my site used to mean tens of thousands of hits; now it’s in the hundreds of thousands.

My blog is but one of a handful that reflect the political potential of Hispanics as swing voters in this election. As I’ve said on my site, "The global conversation is not complete without our voices." Whether in rallies across the country or in voices on my blog, Latinos are becoming a force in the national discourse.

The first candidate I saw reach out to Hispanic bloggers was New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who began holding "blogger briefings" not long after he announced his candidacy. I then contacted all the campaigns and asked to be included on their press lists. In addition to news releases, the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney stayed in weekly contact with me, including quick replies to my e-mails. Clinton’s Hispanic outreach coordinator then, Fabiola Rodriguez-Ciampoli, treated me like any mainstream media reporter, even giving me her cellphone number.

When I requested a "guest" blog entry from all the candidates, Clinton, Mike Gravel, Chris Dodd, Romney and Barack Obama submitted one. Neither John McCain nor Mike Huckabee responded.

Latino bloggers might or might not be able to influence the Latino vote. That’s not the point. What is important is that our voices — and indeed, the voices of the Latino electorate — are finally being heard in the corridors of power and in the mainstream media.

That’s not just good news for Hispanics. That’s good news for the country.

Source: USA Today via Yahoo! News

February 1, 2008
By ANA RIVAS

From California to New York, Hispanic bloggers are speaking up in ways that could influence Latino voters’ decisions just as their votes are becoming more relevant in the presidential race.

The bloggers’ politics vary widely. But with Super Tuesday right around the corner, their writings share a common tone: the urgency of an election year that is, as Latinopundit1 put it, "upon us like salsa on a taco."

The blogs’ bilingual, bicultural character mirrors how Hispanic voters see the election. In Of America6, Roberto Lobato points out the stark difference between Mitt Romney’s English language ads, "chock-full of immigration agents," and his Spanish ad that features his Mexican father. As Mr. Lobato explains, Latino voters will likely see and hear the different English and Spanish messages coming out of the candidate’s mouth.

While traditional media have described Sen. Clinton’s name recognition and alliances within the Latino community as something that could help her in next week’s contests, many Hispanic bloggers had more to say — especially about the Clinton campaign’s reference to Latinos as their "firewall8."

In Latino Politics Blog9, a political science student "from sunny Southern California" wrote that Sen. Clinton shouldn’t be so confident. "When a group has been marginalized for so long and has relatively weak internal leadership, I don’t think that any politician can really call such a group its ‘firewall,’" he wrote in his Jan. 30 entry.

One Latinas Blog11 also asked why "the Latino community is falling for it [Clinton’s name recognition]", and listed 1990s trade deals and Wal-Mart ghosts to warn readers about the New York senator’s past. In that same "gotcha" blogging style, One Latinas Blog posted about the Mexican descent of Arizona Sen. McCain’s Hispanic outreach director. "I consider him a double agent12," the blogger writes, "not working in just the best interests of the United States, but in the best interests of Mexico as well."

On a lighter note, Los Blogueros13, which has followed politics in Spanish since November 2004, fantasized about a combat between former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s rock14 and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama’s reaggeton15, and compared both candidates’ YouTube musical appearances.

Hispanic bloggers are also passionately discussing the racial issues that erupted during the Democratic contest in Nevada, when the first appreciably Latino electorate cast its vote.

"There’s no black-brown divide — just Latino envy," wrote blogger Latina Lista17, claiming that Latinos lacked a national leader. A reader replied that the divide exists because "Mexicans don’t fit" in America’s one-minority scheme. "Where will they put the blacks?"

"If only Oprah understood Spanish," bemoaned Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez of Arizona in her blog, Multiplicative Identity18, before posting a Colombian song19 she thinks could change the election. "Hay Gonzalez blanco, Hay Gonzalez negro", the song goes "Cada quien tiene, tiene del otro su poquitico." (Translation: There are white Gonzalezes, there are black Gonzalezes / Everyone has a bit of the other.)

Source: The Wall Street Journal

14 de Junio, 2007
Por Gustavo Martínez Contreras

Para Juan Guillermo Tornoe trabajar en su blog no es sólo parte de su rutina diaria: es un compromiso.

“Todas las noches, cuando la familia se duerme, me pongo a trabajar en mi blog”, dice Tornoe, guatemalteco avecindado en Austin, Texas, y creador del blog Hispanic Trending.

“Los blogs dan más información a las personas, dan acceso a muchas cosas que regularmente no se cubren en los medios convencionales”, aseguró.

Y es que con el incremento en el número de usuarios hispanos de Internet, se viene también una crecida en la diversidad de voces que suenan desde el ciberespacio a través de blogs o bitácoras en la Red.

De acuerdo con el estudio “The AOL Latino 2006 Hispanic Cyberstudy”, hasta hace seis meses navegaban en la Internet más de 16 millones de hispanos.

De estos, el 52 por ciento lee o escribe en estos blogs, hecho que, según Tornoe, fomenta “la libre expresión de pensamientos y sirve para tener un diálogo”.

Y es que en la Red se hallan las más variadas opiniones y, como dice el mismo Tornoe, “la gente encuentra la información que está buscando”.

Aunque no hay un censo de los blogs hispanos que existen en la actualidad, se ha visto un florecimiento de estas bitácoras que hablan desde cuestiones personales hasta temas políticos y de actualidad. Sin embargo, el estudio AOL indica que el bloguero latino aún se encuentra dando sus primeros pasos y, a la par de este inicio, hay quienes ya están fijando sus ojos en el potencial de este creciente mercado.

Pero el mercado hispano, tal y como sus blogs reflejan, no es tan fácil de entender ni de alcanzar. Cifras dadas a conocer en los reportes “Latinos Online” y “Bloggers: A portrait of the internet’s new storytellers”, elaborados por el Pew Internet and American Life Project, revelan que aún entre la gran masa hispana que sólo habla español en Estados Unidos, compuesta en su mayoría por inmigrantes mexicanos, apenas una de cada tres personas usan la Internet, alejándolos así de cualquier participación en la denominada “democracia digital”.

Esta situación se ve íntimamente relacionada, dice el estudio, con bajos niveles de educación, poco o nulo manejo del inglés y la falta de familiaridad que tienen los hispanos mayores de 60 años con las nuevas tecnologías.

Source: El Reportero Latino