 | |
Type of site | Online newspaper |
|---|---|
| Available in | Spanish |
| Owner | Alberto Federico Ravell |
| Editor | David Moran |
| URL | lapatilla |
| Registration | None |
| Users | +4.5 million (monthly, September 2015)[1] |
| Launched | June 11, 2010; 14 years ago (2010-06-11) |
| Current status | Active |
La Patilla (English:The Watermelon) is a Venezuelan news website that was founded byAlberto Federico Ravell, co-founder and formerCEO ofGlobovisión, in 2010.[2][3] In 2014,El Nuevo Herald statedLa Patilla had hundreds of thousands of visitors per daily.[4] Beginning in early 2018, the website has been censored in Venezuela by theNicolás Maduro government.[5][6][7][8][9]
La Patilla was created by co-founder and former CEO of Globovisión, Alberto Federico Ravell. In 2010, Ravell resigned from Globovisión's board of directors.[10] He createdLa Patilla the same year.[11]BBC Monitoring describedLa Patilla in 2019 as leading among news sources that are "often run by media critics of the government who had been forced to leave their previous journalist jobs because of government pressure and harassment".[11]
In 2014, theWall Street Journal wrote that Venezuelans "have been forced to find alternatives as newspapers and broadcasters struggle withstate efforts to control coverage", with a growing trend of Venezuelans using online news media to bypass government censors.[3] Journalists and press-freedom advocates stated that news websites likeLa Patilla "have helped fill a gap" since those linked to the Venezuelan government had purchased media organizations in Venezuela, such asEl Universal, Globovisión andÚltimas Noticias.[3] In an article inThe Wall Street Journal discussing the rising popularity of news websites in Venezuela,La Patilla CEO Ravell stated that, "The editorial line ofLa Patilla is to call it like it is ... We don't need paper. We don't need a broadcasting license. There's little they can do to squeeze us."[3]
In 2019,Alexa rankedLa Patilla as the 16th most popular website in Venezuela.[2]
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Initially afterLa Patilla's launch, its readership was primarily frompostgraduate educated individuals. In 2015,La Patilla was primarily visited by those who were both college educated and not collegiately educated. One of the primary browsing locations for users was at school and at work.[12][non-primary source needed]By 2018, according to Alexa, visitors were primarily college educated or in graduate school, with homes and work places becoming the main browsing locations while visits from schools declined.[13]
In 2013,Freedom House describedLa Patilla as having a pro-opposition stance.[14]The Wall Street Journal described the website as a news aggregator.[3]
On 17 May 2012,La Patilla was covering violent clashes occurring at a Venezuelan prison,La Planta, through alive stream video feed. Visitors ofLa Patilla reported that the website was experiencing "irregularities" and thought it was due to technical problems. It was discovered later thatLa Patilla was blocked by the government-runCANTV. CANTV blockedLa Patilla's originalIP address and afterLa Patilla changed its IP address, CANTV blocked it again. Readers ofLa Patilla criticized the blockage by CANTV saying it was a "violation of their right to information". Readers also assumed the blockage by the government was due to the coverage of the prison clashes.[15][16][17] David Moran, editor ofLa Patilla stated that "Censorship has been multidimensional against us".[4]
Weeks after theVenezuelan presidential election in 2018,La Patilla had theirHypertext Transfer Protocol censored from 6 June 2018 to 11 June 2018 by the state-run CANTV and private internet service providers who were complying with government regulations.[18] Since June 2018, CANTV has blocked access toLa Patilla.[5]
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On 22 April 2014, reporters fromLa Patilla, who were covering events in Santa Fe, were retained by the National Guard. The reporters were accused of being "fake journalists", had to show their ID's to the National Guardsmen and had their pictures taken. They were later released without further complications.[19] On 12 May 2014, a photojournalist fromLa Patilla was assaulted by National Police who tried to take his camera and hit him in the head with thebutt of a shotgun while he covering protests in Las Mercedes.[20][21][22] A week later on 20 May 2014, the sameLa Patilla photojournalist was assaulted by the National Police who tried to take his camera while covering protests in the Las Minitas neighborhood inBaruta.[23] On 27 May 2014, a reporter forLa Patilla was shot in the arm by a National Guardsman while covering clashes in Táchira.[24] In April 2017, aLa Patilla reporter was shot in the leg at close range with a tear gas canister, fracturing his tibia.[25]
On 11 August 2015, then President of the National Assembly,Diosdado Cabello, suedLa Patilla and other media organizations for reporting that he was being investigated for his ties to drug trafficking and his alleged role in theCartel of the Suns. On 31 May 2017, Bolivarian officialPedro Carreño leaked a document prior to trial of a decision by Venezuelan courts to award Cabello 1 billionbolívares ($500,000 USD in May 2017). Cabello stated that with the money, "I am going to pay the lawyers and I will give that to the poor children". The lawyer forLa Patilla, Alejandra Rodríguez, stated that "to publish the contents of a judicial act in the middle of a controversy, of which Pedro Carreño is not a party, invalidates the judicial proceedings ... If that decision is true, it would demonstrate once again that in Venezuela there is no separation of powers and that the Judiciary is an appendage of theUnited Socialist Party of Venezuela".[26]
In June 2019,La Patilla was charged and fined 30 billion sovereign bolivars (about $5 million) after publishing anDiario ABC article[27] that mentioned the president of the pro-Maduro2017 Constituent National Assembly,Diosdado Cabello, in relation to drug trafficking in Venezuela.La Patilla's director Ravell, supporter ofJuan Guaidó duringthe presidential crisis, wrote that Cabello was engaging in "judicial terrorism". Cabello stated that he would take control of the website if it was unable to pay the fine.[28] Cabello had previously tried to raise judicial processes against ABC andThe Wall Street Journal for accusations of drug trafficking, but the cases were rejected.[28] Nathalie Southwick (CPJ) said that the measure taken againstLa Patilla was an "attempt to bankrupt and shut down a critical outlet" and provided an "example of how the Venezuelan judicial system is being used to retaliate against critical media".[29]