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Martin Rodriguez Pellecer of Nomada SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- You usually don't hear an investigative journalist talk about the importance of learning business skills. But that is the case with Martin Rodriguez Pellecer , 32, founder of two notable digital news media organizations in Guatemala, Plaza Publica and Nomada , the latter launched last year. Versi�n en espa�ol "The most difficult thing for a journalist is to think like a capitalist, to realize that you have to invest and put money on the line", he told me in an interview. "You have to be flexible; you can't wed yourself to just one thing. You have to have lots of eggs in different baskets. No successful capitalist has just one line of business; all of them have lots of businesses." Read more �

A Toronto man stands accused of trading without registration and violating regulatory bans imposed on him by the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC). The OSC announced on Wednesday that Wesley Weber has been charged in connection with alleged breaches of securities law, including one count of trading without registration, one count of trading while prohibited, and one count of acting as a director or officer while prohibited. Back in 2011, the OSC banned Weber from trading, registration, and from serving as an officer or director, for 15 years (along with other sanctions) after the OSC found that he violated the securities laws in Craigslist postings that promised �free day trading lessons� to individuals that deposited at least $300,000 into a trading account. An OSC hearing found that through the postings, Weber and his company, Goldbridge Financial Inc., were holding themselves out as investment advisers without being registered; that he misled commission staff during their investig...

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- The United States has been the world's biggest market for just about everything, including illegal drugs , and that creates big problems for its neighbors. Carla Minet Versi�n en espa�ol So much money from the drug trade flows into Mexico, South America, and the Caribbean that it corrupts governments, courts, police, armed forces, trade regulators, and other institutions that were not that strong to begin with. The result is that many of these countries are ruled, de facto, by the whims of organized crime and not in the public interest. Criminal organizations have gone global, and investigative journalists need to go global as well in order to expose this corruption and serve their communities better. Cross-border cooperation was the big takeaway from a three-day meeting of investigative journalists from 17 countries in San Juan, Puerto Rico, November 4-6. Billed as " The First Caribbean Meeting of Investigative Journalists: Tracking the Stories t...

A year ago I wrote an article about digital media startups around the world and attempts to categorize and analyze them. Some of that material is now a bit dated, and I have come across some other analyses and lists that have good road maps for media entrepreneurs . The Open Society Foundations has sponsored a series of studies. One of them is Publishing for Peanuts: Innovation and the Journalism Startup , by JJ Robinson, Kristen Grennan, and Anya Schiffrin of the Columbia University School of International and Political Affairs. The study takes an in-depth look at 35 "innovative media outlets" producing high-quality news that have a chance at long-term survival. Researchers have often neglected examples outside of Europe and North America, so this study included examples from South Africa , China , Brazil , Mexico , Colombia , India , Kenya , Nigeria , Egypt , and Bosnia Herzegovina , among others. Read more �