- El Norte (newspaper)
Infobox_Newspaper
name = "El Norte"
type =Daily newspaper
format =newsprint
foundation =1938
owners =Grupo Reforma
political =Non-partisan
headquarters = Washington 629 Ote.Monterrey
NL,Mexico
64000
editor =Martha Treviño
website = [http://www.elnorte.com]"El Norte", managed by
Alejandro Junco de la Vega andRodolfo Junco de la Vega , is the largestnewspaper in the north of Mexico. The newspaper is part ofGrupo Reforma news group.In
1962 it was awarded theMaria Moors Cabot prize . It was also awarded the Mergenthaler Award in1963 and1976 .[http://www.reforma.com "'Grupo Reforma] is the largest newspaper company in Mexico. It publishes 9 daily newspapers in 4 cities, including the leading newspapers in Mexico's 3 largest cities. "
Reforma " in Mexico City, "El Norte " inMonterrey and "Mural " in Guadalajara. It also publishes "Palabra " inSaltillo , as well as the dailies Metro in Mexico city, Monterrey, Guadalajara and Saltillo, and the afternoon tabloid El Sol in Monterrey. The average daily circulation of all these papers is 1.2 million copies.The group also owns the largest content-intensive Internet Web Sites in Mexico, [http://www.reforma.com reforma.com] , [http://www.elnorte.com elnorte.com] , [http://www.mural.com mural.com] and [http://www.palabra.com palabra.com] . It owns the largest newswire service with Mexican information, Agencia Reforma. It currently has partnerships with two leading US newspapers to publish, Cancha, a tabloid with Mexican sports and entertainment news. Cancha is published biweekly in San Antonio with The San Antonio Express-News and weekly in Portland, Oregon in partnership with The Oregonian.
Grupo Reforma has strategic alliances with leading US dailies to publish their information in its papers, including a daily section of The Wall Street Journal and a weekly section of The New York Times.
History
The newsgroup is 85 years old. It all started with the founding of El Sol in April 1922, followed by El Norte in 1938, Monterrey's Metro in 1988, Reforma in 1993, Palabra and Mexico city's Metro in 1997, Mural in 1998, Saltillo's Metro in 2004 and Guadalajara's Metro in 2005.
Grupo Refoma's independent journalism drew the ire of the powerful Mexico city's carrier union barely a year after it was born. This syndicate controls distribution of all newspapers in the capital city and was traditionally used by the political system to bring down any paper that was deemed unacceptable. The carried union boycotted the distribution of Reforma in Mexico city in October 1994. Grupo Reforma decided to create and independent distribution channel to sell Reforma in Mexico city's streets. The support of the readers was incredible: intellectuals, artists and regular folks joined Reforma's personnel in the process to create this channel. Dozens of people went to the streets to sell the paper, withstandin the verbal and even physical violence of the carrier union. Currently, Reforma is distributed independently to the homes of 85,000 subscribers, to supermarkets and other retail outlets and to readers in Mexico city's streets. The paper's daily circulation averages 200,000 coopies.
Grupo Reforma's dailies have an open journalism model that is very different from any newspaper in the world. One of the cornerstones of this model are the editorial boards. Each section of all of the papers has an editorial board, which is a group of readers and leaders in the section's area of interest that get together weekly or bi-monthly to set the section's editorial agenda. For example, the editorial board of Reforma's national section may include a diputado (member of house of representatives), a senator, several politicians, some members of NGO's, as well as normal readers, like housewives, students, etc...
The boards have complete liberty of action in setting what the paper is covering. The board is led by each section's editor, so the board members are working with the person who is directly responsible for the daily operation of the section.
Each board session is divided in two parts. In the first one, the board members criticize the content of the session since the last time they met. What was done right? What needs to be corrected? What was plainly wrong? These and other similar topics are dealt with in this first discussion.
During the next step in the session, the discussion centers on the work ahead. What stories should the section be working on? Who should the paper be interviewing? Are there any events that are worth covering? It is in this part of the meeting where the editorial agenda is defined by the group.
Each year, 850 people are part of the 70 editorial boards that define the editorial agenda for all of Grupo Reforma's papers. More than 8 thousand people have been members of an editorial board during the 15 years that they have been in operation. Participation is voluntary, so no payment is given out to the board members. The "payment" they receive is to see how they indeed are setting the agenda for some of the most influential newspapers in Mexico and thus collaborating to transform the country. The boards are renewed every year, but a couple of the members are chosen by the same board to stay on, so there is some continuity with any work in progress that was left behind. Every quarter, the editor gives his/her board a balance of all the suggestions they've provided and how they have been implemented in the section.
Criticism
Grupo Reforma was created by Alejandro y Rodolfo Junco de la vega. Rodolfo Junco de la Vega Sr. was the founder of El Sol and El Norte, the newspaper from which the group emanated. It has been argued that Alejandro and Rodolfo Junco de la Vega Jr. illegally took the newspaper from their father Rodolfo Junco de la Vega Sr. taking advantage of some legal gaps on the Mexican system and other scams. In late 2005 and 2006 a video was released in which Rodolfo Junco de la Vega Sr. appears explaining how the illegal take over took place and the threats that he has been subject to on behalf of his two older sons.
The independent journalism model of Grupo Reforma has drawn many attacks, both verbal and physical, from politicians and other powerful groups whose interests have been affected by the true stories that have been published in the papers in the 85 years the group has been around.
References
External links
1. [http://www.reforma.com "'Grupo Reforma]
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