• AP/BusinessWeek , Friday, March 10, 2006 10 AM

The conventional wisdom holds that one of the fastest growing niches in media is the Spanish-language sector. In recent years, the explosion of Spanish-language magazine titles, not to mention television and radio programs, has been mind-boggling. Now comes evidence that English-language media are performing especially well with Spanish-speaking audiences. The reason is not hard to fathom: Young Latinos especially are largely bilingual these days. Many, in fact, see Spanish as a second language, especially if they've been raised in the United States. The Associated Press: "'The real future of the Hispanic targeted media and advertising is in English,'" says David Morse, president of New American Dimensions, a multicultural marketing research company. Catering to that market can be lucrative. In May, L.A.'s Latino 96.3 radio scrapped its Spanish contemporary music for 'Spanglish'-speaking DJs who play reggaeton, a Caribbean fusion that mixes hip-hop and Latin beats and has become increasingly popular with Americans." The trend seems significant. According to the AP story, some Latinos and Hispanics are offended by Spanish-only media that seem to make the assumption their audiences speak but one language. In fact, many in the population are multilingual.

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