As the MTV's Video Music Awards head back to Miami, their Latin American sister awards are moving out, and taking the show to Mexico City.
MTV Latin America launched in 1993 from offices on Lincoln Road. Last year's Awards Show broadcast live to 14.1 million cable viewers in Latin America and on MTV2 in the United States, with subsequent showings on other Latin American channels and MTV in the United States.
But the channel's real audience is in Latin America -- except for the awards, it is not broadcast in the United States. And MTV Latin America executives have long said they would like to take the event to its home base. More than one-third of their viewers, or 4.9 million, are in Argentina, followed by Mexico with 3.9 million.
The Latin VMA's face a crowded field in Miami. The media and celebrity blitz that accompanied the mainstream VMAs' Miami debut at the AmericanAirlines Arena last August cast a shadow on the lower-key Latin version less than two months later. Two of Latin music's four major awards shows, Univision's Premio Lo Nuestro and Telemundo's Billboard Latin Music Awards, are held here. The Latin Grammys visited Miami in 2002, but have otherwise stuck to Los Angeles.
Source: Miami Hearld (registration required)
