Troubled by the introduction of bills that would create information crimes in Peru, the Press and Society Institute (IPYS in Spanish) and several other international organizations penned an open letter to the Peruvian Congress regarding the right to freedom of information, reported the newspaper Perú21 on Tuesday, Aug. 7.
The Latin American Union of News Agencies (ULAN in Spanish) accused private news media outlets of provoking "small coups" in Latin America and also withdrew membership from the Paraguayan Information state news agency.
Since the Brazilian Law of Information Access went into effect on May 16, the Brazilian federal government has received 17,516 requests to access documents and other information.
Roughly 100 Venezuelan journalists based in the United States have created an association in Miami aimed representing members' interests and improving professionalism, reported El Universal.
In 2011, 68 percent of Brazilian journalists used Twitter as their main tool for spreading news, according to a new digital journalism study from Oriella PR Network. The study, which aimed at understanding how the press worldwide is using digital technologies, interviewed about 500 journalists from 15 countries - 84 of those interviewed were Brazilian.
The trend of newspapers implementing paywalls is emerging in Brazil. Starting on Thursday, June 21, the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo will start charging a fee to access the content on its website, which will have the entire printed edition available, reported the same newspaper.
In its biannual Global Transparency Report, Google reported that in the past six months, the Internet giant has received more than 1,000 requests from governments around the world to take down information, whether YouTube videos or search listings, according to CNET. This "alarming" level of steadily increasing government censorship included 187 requests from the U.S. government to remove 6,192 pieces of content, 42 percent of which Google complied with, Google said. That's a 103 percent increase over the previous six-month period, reported Politico.
On Tuesday, June 12, the Argentine Journalism Forum applauded the new public information access in the Misiones Province of Argentina, which was approved on June 7 by the provincial congress, and said that this "means a significant step forward for freedom of expression, state transparency, and citizens' rights in democracy."
In only 15 days, four radio broadcasters and two TV channels were closed in Ecuador, reported the news agency EFE. The Ecuadorian NGO Fundamedios reported that the closed news media outlets are the TV channels Telesangay (of the province of Morona Santiago), Lidervisión (from Napo), and the radios stations El Dorado (from Sucumbíos), Líder (from Napo), Pantera (from Pichincha), and Net (from Tungurahua), reported the news paper El Comercio.
On Saturday, June 9, Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa said that he is considering preventing public officials from granting interviews to for-profit, private news media, in an attempt to financing those families that own these news media outlets, reported the news agency EFE.
The British newspaper The Guardian said it had documents that proved that a Mexican presidential candidate bought favorable coverage on the most important TV station in the country, Televisa.
Cuban authorities have given independent journalist Alexis Ferrer 72 hours to leave the island, reported the site Cuba Encuentro.