There is a massive Twitter hashtag campaign unfolding in Venezuela asking people to unfollow Venezuelan News Channel @globovision. People participating in this campaign are very angry over Globovision's recent refusal to broadcast a live event by opposition leader Henrique Capriles Radonski.The hashtags #UnfollowMasivoaGlobovision, #EstampidaGlobovisión, #YaNoSigoAGlobovision are gaining traction and as a result @globovision has been loosing followers at an alarming rate. @ElUniversal newspaper reports a drop of 64,000 in less than 48hours.
Globovisión has been recently purchased by a group of investors rumored to be front men of strong man Diosdado Cabello, currently President of the Venezuelan National Assembly and one of the richest man in Venezuela. He reportedly exerts behind the scene control over many governmental institutions and is said to be in a dead heat fight against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over political control of the country.
The acquisition of Globovisión will allow Cabello to silence one the last openly critical voices in a media landscape dominated by the Venezuelan government. The few privately held channels such as Venevision (owned by media mogul Gustavo Cisneros) or Televen have adopted self-censorship as way of maintaining their business.
Given this situation, it will be interesting to see whether people will resort more to alternative media channels as a way of disseminating uncensored news. Social media platforms such as Tweeter, Facebook, YouTube, Google Hangouts and Ustream are already very popular for uploading content.
