Gawker Media's Latino Site Guanabee Relaunches in Spanish
Latino site still aims to attract Latinos in the U.S.
May 21, 2013— -- Back in December, I spoke with Daniel Mauser, founder of Guanabee (and, full disclosure, my former boss) about Gawker Media's acquistion of the pop culture-focused English-language site for Latinos. At the time, Mauser, who was tapped to run Gizmodo en Español, cited his interest in Gawker Media's then-new platform, Kinja, as a major factor in agreeing to head up the tech site.
Well, Guanabee is now relaunching on that Kinja platform -- entirely in Spanish.
He said the switch in language was not meant to be seen as a shift in the site's demo from U.S. Latinos to a Latin American audience. "When we decided to relaunch Guanabee," he said, "we thought about who our core readers were: latin pop culture and entertainment addicts. And we realized that writing in Spanish gave us more flexibility in terms of coverage and reach. The demo is not a switch from U.S. Latinos to Latin Americans, although we do foresee reaching Latin Americans as well. The focus will remain U.S. Hispanics."
The site's coverage will remain the same, too. It will largely focus on entertainment, pop culture, and relevant news presented in a humorous, irreverent voice.
And with Kinja, Daniel explains, comes "a change towards simplicity that encourages participation." Users will be able to, for example, comment on images and write their own stories, with the best items enjoying promotion on the site's front page.
Guanabee's current editor, Marcelo Baez, will remain onboard.
