 Good morning. It's great to see all of you here today in this beautiful day in Sacramento. I hope you're not too sad that you're missing it, but you'll be out soon and you can enjoy the weather. We love the weather. I'd like to welcome everyone here today to our Congressional Forum on Net Neutrality. It's great to be here in the State Capitol. And I'd like to thank those of you in the audience for coming to hear this important discussion on the future of the Internet. I'd also like to welcome those of you who are watching this online. The debate happening right now in Washington, D.C. over net neutrality is critically important, but it should not be confined to the Hall of the Federal Bureaucracy alone. This is one of the central reasons I have brought this hearing to my district in Sacramento, the capital of our great state of California. This hearing will be part of the Energy and Commerce Committee record thanks to ranking member Henry Waxman of California. This format will be the same as our committee hearings in Washington, D.C. For the last few months, I've been calling on the FCC to take the net neutrality show on the road and listen to and engage with Americans on the impact that the current net neutrality proposal put forth by Chairman Wheeler will have on consumers, entrepreneurs, small business, and other stakeholders. To that point, I am very pleased that we have two FCC commissioners with us today, Commissioner Minion Clyburn and Commissioner Jessica Rosenwarzel. These two accomplished commissioners have a reputation of making thoughtful and fair-minded decisions on the policy challenges facing our innovation economy, whether it is expanding broadband to lower-income communities, schools, and libraries, or unleashing more spectrum and ensuring interoperability through our mobile devices can perform nationwide. Commissioners Clyburn and Rosenwarzel have championed a diverse set of critical communications issues in the public interest. In fact, recently both commissioners were named by the prestigious national journal as leading women in the country who shape technology policy. We are fortunate, very fortunate, they travel from Washington, D.C. to be here today to share their views and engage in this important topic. And we all know that the internet is a very personal thing to all Americans. We use the internet for just about everything we do today, reading the news, applying for a job, taking educational classes, dreaming or actually streaming a TV show or starting a business. The digital economy is an integral part of our lives. There are so many times we just take it for granted. So when it comes, it seems like the internet, as we know it today, may change and not for the better. Americans do speak up and that is what we're seeing today. Earlier this year, the D.C. Circuit Court struck down two of the FCC's 2010 open internet rules which maintain a basic level of protection for consumers and innovators on the internet. In response, Chairman Wheeler presented a proposal to restore these protections that received a lot of attention across the country. Over 3.7 million comments have been filed with the commission which is absolutely a record-setting number for FCC proceeding, even more than the Janet Jackson malfunction, which I think was only about 1.5. Now, I have personally heard from hundreds of my own constituents here in Sacramento about the importance of preserving an open internet. I've heard from Liam, who wrote to me that Chairman Wheeler's proposal to allow the internet fast lanes would cripple people's ability to get the content they need for everyone, for everything, from building a small business to strengthening community involvement. Gage wrote to me saying that the net neutrality was the most important free speech issue today and that competition between business on the internet was possible because major companies all offered access to the same connection speeds. Matt wrote, as Californians, our tech-based economy needs an open and fast internet or we may not be able to keep up with other nations. These are only a few of the hundreds of emails and calls I received in response to Chairman Wheeler's current net neutrality proposal. I agree with many of my constituents that the current net neutrality proposal by Chairman Wheeler is severely flawed. It would upend the basic principle that has guided the internet's growth since its inception that all data must be treated equally. Specifically, I believe that the practice of paid prioritization by broadband providers would dramatically reshuffle the digital deck. It would alter the public's unfettered ability to access content online and threaten competition and innovation. Pay prioritization would allow a broadband provider the ability to offer preferential treatment to one content provider over another for a fee. If the final FCC proposal allows this to become reality, consumer choice will be at the mercy of the highest bidder and it would create a two-tiered internet leading to fast lanes for some and slow lanes for others. In a nutshell, paid prioritization is a tax on innovation and consumer choice. In fact, the only certainty that paid prioritization would bring to the internet ecosystem is that it would stifle creativity, investment and squeeze out new competition. It would prevent the next Google or Amazon from hitting the digital economy. Americans are not standing for that and I'm not standing for that. That's why I along with Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont introduced the Online Competition and Consumer Choice Act which requires the FCC to exercise its legal authority to ban paid prioritization agreements or so-called internet fast lanes between ISPs and content providers on the last mile internet connection to residential consumers or small business. I'm hopeful that the FCC will ultimately propose a set of rules later this year that preserves net neutrality and spurs innovation and consumer choice. There needs to be transparency. There needs to be openness of the internet. I'm also hopeful that the chairman's final net neutrality proposal will prevent paid prioritization agreements from entering the marketplace. There is no room in our economy for this sort of anti-competitive practice. Today we have a great panel of witnesses. We have a California PUC commissioner. We have a Sacramento librarian. We have a venture capitalist. We have a Sacramento public broadcaster. And we have a Hollywood screenwriter and producer. All of our panelists offer unique perspectives about the critical role the internet plays in our lives and the importance of protecting and open internet. And I look forward to hearing from them shortly. But I also know many of you here today and those watching online have comments you'd like to share about how the FCC's current net neutrality proposal would impact you. To that end, I have set up an email address, which is www.matsui.com. I underscore public comments, one word, at mail.house.gov, that you can email your comments to. And please know I will share these closely with the commissioners and also with Chairman Wheeler. And I look forward to hearing from all of you. Now I will now yield to Commissioner Clyburn for an opening statement. Thank you and good morning. I'm Congresswoman Matsui. I really appreciate you hosting this congressional forum, which focuses on what I believe is one of the most important issues before the Federal Communications Commission today, retaining and promoting a free and open internet for everyone. The Congresswoman clearly understands the importance of her free internet. And I appreciate her leadership on this, as well as many other issues including broadband adoption and lifeline. I sincerely appreciate the invitation to participate and believe it is important to hear the views of interested parties outside of the Beltway. This hearing, as a Congresswoman noted, will be a part of the House Energy and Commerce Committee record. And I am pleased to note that the forum and materials available will also be a part of the official Federal Communications Commission record with the open internet docket 1428. So your voices from Sacramento and beyond will be heard. Speaking of voices, as you've heard, over 3,700 have spoken and we are listening. These numbers speak volumes of the tremendous impact the impact the internet has had on our society. Consumers, entrepreneurs, librarians, teachers, doctors, writers, venture capitalists, state officials, edge providers, content providers, filed comments in our proceeding wanting the FCC to know their views. For many, this marks the first time they have participated in a government proceeding and highlights not only the importance of a free and open internet, but the power such openness has to encourage civic engagement. As a public servant, I believe my mission is to listen to the voices of consumers and give voice to those who may be unable to speak. As the FCC moves forward to consider permanent rules, my focus will be on the impact on consumers. Something that I fear has gotten lost in this debate over 706 versus Title II and the parsing through each word of the D.C. Circuit's decision. The legal issues are of course important, but to me it puts the cart before the horse. The critical question as I see it is first determining the right policy and when that is established, then and only then determine we should, the appropriate legal framework to achieve that result. So just what does this mean to focus on consumers? It means ensuring that those consumers continue to pick winners and losers, not companies giving priority or the government dictating a result, for this is the free market at its best and that free market needs to be preserved. It also means looking at how consumers are using the internet over fixed and mobile devices. We must ask and determine what are the trends so we can craft rules that are flexible enough. We need to ask what is the demand and what are the projections? What proportion of traffic is mobile versus fixed? One trend is clear. The increased reliance on mobile broadband. Mobile broadband looks quite different than it did in 2010 when the FCC adopted different open internet rules for mobile versus fix. The deployment of LTE was in its infancy in 2010 with 200,000 LTE subscribers today. There are over 120 million and LTE has been deployed to a projected 300 million Americans. The use of Wi-Fi has also increased and the trend suggests it will continue to do so. Cisco projects that 52% of mobile data traffic will be offloaded to Wi-Fi by 2018 and from the consumer's perspective, they often do not know whether they are using serial data or Wi-Fi because the transition is seamless. To me, this means we need to be careful to avoid creating differing or conflicting standards or rules for Wi-Fi in mobile. Along with increases in mobile broadband, the number of Americans who rely exclusively on a mobile device or a recent Pew Research Report is 41% and that is up from 29% in 2010. For lower-income Americans, 56% are wireless only and that is up from 39% in 2010 and for Latinos of all income levels. The number of wireless-only households is 53% up from 38% in 2010. For many of these lower-income and Latino consumers, their mobile device is their only access to broadband if they have broadband at all. Given these trends, I will be focusing on my review on how different proposals will impact the consumer's experience. What is the impact on a consumer whose mobile broadband may be her only access to broadband? If we have lower standards for mobile, will providers make clear that the experience may be different? Will consumers understand that apps or content could be blocked? And if we have a different standard, will it disproportionately impact communities that rely on their mobile device for connectivity as we continue this debate and review? I vow to remain focused on the consumer impact. My door remains open and I will be listening to you. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Clyburn. Commissioner Rosenwater, your opening statement. Good morning. It's always good to get out of Washington and it's terrific to be here in Sacramento. So thank you to Congresswoman Matsui for being such a dynamo and thought leader back in Washington for holding this hearing and for having me here today. It's also a treat to be here with my friend and colleague, Commissioner Clyburn, and I'm grateful to each and every one of our witnesses for joining us today. So let's start with what we know. I know this. Our application, our internet economy is the envy of the world. We invented it. The applications economy began right here on our shores and some would say right here in this state. The broadband below us and the airwaves all around us deliver its collective might to our homes and businesses and communities across the country. What produced this dynamic engine of entrepreneurship and experimentation is a foundation of openness. Sustaining what has made us innovative, fierce, and creative should not be a choice. It should be an obligation. We also have a duty. A duty to protect what has made the internet the most dynamic platform for free speech ever invented. It is our printing press. It is our town square. It is our individual soapbox and our collective platform for opportunity. That's why I support network neutrality. I believe the FCC must find a way to put open internet policies back in place because we cannot have a two-tiered internet with fast lanes that speed the traffic of the privileged and leave the rest of us lagging behind. Because, as you will probably hear today, paid prioritization can be a tax on innovation. So, as we look for a way forward, I am pleased that FCC Chairman Wheeler has recently acknowledged that all options, including Title II, remain on the table. And as we proceed, we must also be mindful of the more than 3.7 million people who have written the agency to express their opinion. Openness and transparency matter, too. It's good the FCC is hosting internet roundtables back in Washington, but we should be open to more than holding discussions inside our building, inside the Beltway. Because this is big, really big. So kudos to all of you for being here today. I wish all my colleagues were here and that we would hold discussions just like this with every commissioner present in communities all across the country. So now for the best part. I stopped talking, and we get to hear from you. So thank you, Sacramento, and thank you, Congresswoman Matsui, for making this happen. Thank you, Commissioner Rosenwald, so for being here and Commissioner Clyburn. Before I start with the witnesses, I wanted to enter a letter from Senator Padilla, who is the chairman of the California State Committee on Energy Utilities and Communications and author of the legislation promoting broadband deployment and adoption into the record of this hearing and copies of this will be available on the table. Now we'll move to testimony from the very important people who are here today. Our witnesses. Each witness will have up to five minutes for an opening statement, so if you can keep it within five minutes, it would be great. First of all, I would like to introduce our first witness, Commissioner Catherine Sandoval of the California Public Utilities Commission. Commissioner Sandoval was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown on January 2011 to serve as commissioner of the California Public Utilities Commission. Her appointment and confirmation to the post made her the first Latina to serve as CPUC commissioner in the agency's 100-year history. She serves as a vice chair of the National Association, a regulatory utility commissioners telecommunications committee, long title there. Commissioner Sandoval is also a tenured professor at Santa Clara University School of Law. Thank you, Commissioner Sandoval, for being here today and you can proceed. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Congressman Metsui, for convening this important forum in Sacramento, in California, and for inviting me and all of the witnesses to be here today to speak. And special thanks to commissioners Clyburn and Rosenwurzel for coming out to California and for encouraging these public forums. I also wanted to especially thank both of you, Commissioner Clyburn and Rosenwurzel, for your separate statements in the open Internet MPRM. Both of you said that you would have done it differently and I concur. As a commissioner of the California Public Utilities Commission and also a member of the Federal State Joint Services, a joint board on advanced services, along with Commissioner Rosenwurzel and Commissioner Clyburn has been the appointed commissioner to that board, I believe it is very important to have a free and open Internet. And I'd like to talk to you about why this is absolutely critical, not only to American freedom, but to American public safety. The FCC's proposal to allow ISPs to require individualized, differentiated, non-transparent negotiations is dangerous to public safety, to public health, the open Internet, the American economy and democracy. America's critical infrastructure sectors have high reliability and safety duties and need an open and reliable Internet with low transaction and access costs. FCC, in its open Internet proceeding, the FCC defined edge providers who might be subject to negotiations to include all content providers and the definition is so broad as to include everyone, all individuals, all organizations who use the Internet. It even specifically contemplates an individual musician with a YouTube video. Now, I have several YouTube videos where I ask people to conserve energy in the light of the outage of the San Jose Nuclear Power Plant when in one minute Southern California lost 20% of its power and conservation was critical to prevent blackouts. Now, the California Brown Bear is getting more hits than I'm getting on his YouTube video to encourage people to save water in light of our California's terrible drought. But this is just an example of how energy, water and critical infrastructure uses the open Internet. Internet access delayed due to ISP bargaining with energy utilities or third parties could hamper critical safety and reliability operations and harm public safety. Internet enabled systems are used to open and close pumps and in sub skater systems to operate various devices. Internet enabled systems are also used to ask people or Internet enabled devices, the Internet of Things, to reduce energy demand and can save blackouts, can prevent blackouts. It can also increase lighting when unauthorized people are near remote utility plants or light up the way for an ambulance along the way to the hospital. Subjecting Internet access to negotiations and slowdowns to minimum speeds can make pumps fail to open so they don't provide water for cooling a power plant or water to fight a fire. Minimum speeds are not enough. This can have devastating, deadly and cascading consequences. Some high reliability and safety, energy, water and communication systems are not directly connected to the open Internet to preserve cybersecurity and reliability. If the Internet became more unreliable due to negotiations that hold up access, more systems would have to be switched to non-Internet enabled services, creating disincentives to invest in such systems and making it more difficult to secure regulatory approval to spend rate payer money on such systems. The CPUC has approved Internet enabled electronic records keeping for gas pipeline operators. This provides fast access which is critical in responding to emergencies. Failure to maintain records in a safe and reliable fashion has been charged as a criminal violation under the Federal Pipeline Safety Act. The public utilities and regulators need Internet access to be speedy and reliable so utilities can recall records when needed and prevent injury, explosions and loss of life or damage to property. In last month's 6.0 Napa earthquake, PG&E deployed a new Internet enabled technology, PCARO, to detect natural gas leaks after the ground shaking disturbed gas pipelines. The CPUC approved the use of PCARO in July of 2014 because it detects gas leaks at a rate 1,000 times better than old techniques. PCARO was born through an open Internet as its inventor realized that it could use the methane detection technology to develop for a completely different purpose to detect gas pipeline leaks. And then he was able to map that, what he detected, the leaks that he detected through Google Earth and enable through mobile broadband access to be able to have pipeline technicians use those maps through using mobile tablets and phones to go to pinpoint places and fix leaks prioritized by PCARO by severity. Innovation was fast and affordable due to the open Internet making it an affordable and efficient and effective investment for ratepayers. PCARO and PG&E didn't have to negotiate with ISPs to get access to the Internet at fast speeds or at speeds for which they contracted or to be able to send these fat GIS based files. PG&E's customers, Californians and all of us are counting on this technology to increase safety and to save rate payer money. The CPUC also runs the California Teleconnect Fund and my colleague Commissioner Peterman is the assigned commissioner to that proceeding. Our fund also expands on e-rates and provides discounts to Internet-supported services at schools, libraries, health care centers and nonprofits. The California Telehealth Network also supports rural telecommunications and enables life-saving diagnosis and treatment. For stroke patients, seconds count. Brain and function saving medicine, TPA, works best if it's given right away and must be injected or delivered by IV within 60 minutes of a stroke to be most effective in minimizing brain damage. Through the telehealth network and our investments, UC Davis Stroke Specialists are able to diagnose a patient at a rural hospital using high-speed, high-resolution cameras to detect whether the patient is having a stroke. Accurate diagnosis is a prerequisite to being able to administer the medicine. Doctors working to save lives and with a duty of care and patients relying on the faster Internet connections in the telehealth network have already bargained for contracts to assure their access to an Internet and for that Internet, speed matters and minimum speeds wouldn't cut it. The FCC proposal greatly increases transaction costs to the Internet and could increase Internet fees. It will facilitate anti-competitive marketing to raise rival's costs to get faster speeds than competitors. Doing so raises market manipulation issues in regulated markets such as FERC-administered energy markets. Call completion problems could also blossom as traffic from rural carriers and other common carriers and VOAP companies can't get through during ISP negotiations. And Lifeline, which we have also worked so hard on, could have its verification efforts frustrated by ISP negotiations or slowdown. As for example, California verifies 100% of Lifeline applicants through Internet-enabled platforms and with our new extension of Lifeline to Mobile we're now adding more than 30,000 Internet customers and Lifeline customers a month, 100% of them verified for eligibility through Internet-enabled applications. So in closing, to protect an open Internet, the FCC must use both Section 706 and Title II with forbearance and a light regulatory touch. Thank you again for your consideration and for holding this important form. Thank you very much, Commissioner Sandoval. I would now like to welcome our next witness, Rivka Sass, Executive Director of the Sacramento Library System. Rivka is one of the most forward-thinking and creative librarians in the country. She brings over 30 years as experienced as a librarian. She has been named National Librarian of the Year by the Library Journal. Rivka has been a leading voice in telecommunications issues facing national libraries and has testified before the House Energy and Commerce Committee in Washington, D.C. on national broadband adoption policies. We're all lucky that Rivka is in Sacramento and in charge of our library system. Thank you, Rivka, for being here today and you may proceed with your testimony. And you, uh, yeah. There we go. Sorry. I'm going to start over with your... Well, the light went on. I should have known. Sorry. Congresswoman Matsui, I appreciate the opportunity to come before you today at this Congressional Forum on Net Neutrality. I also want to thank FCC commissioners Clyburn and Rosen Murtzel for your leadership on this important issue. The subject that we're discussing today is critical to the Sacramento Public Library Authority. Our community and, indeed, our library is a microcosm of America. I'm grateful for the opportunity to be here to represent our community of users. Sacramento Public Library is the fourth largest library in California. We serve 1.4 million people at 28 locations. We're proud to serve one of the most diverse communities in America and to provide services that prepare young children to be ready for school, to help children after school with their homework, to help job seekers apply for jobs online and to help adults who fell through the cracks of our educational system complete their GEDs and now we're the second library in the United States to be able to offer an online accredited high school diploma. And we're very proud of that. Most importantly, Sacramento Public Library provides free and open access to information in all of its many formats. Two policies govern Sacramento Public Library's philosophy of access. It's our collection development policy which our board approved in 2011 and the library's internet access policy also board approved in 2007. Our collection policy affirms that the fundamental role that the library's collection plays in a successful community is free access to information. As a librarian with more than three decades of experience in the profession, I've seen the formats come and go but the principles of information access remain the same. Access to the internet is simply one more tool that allows librarians to bring people and information together. The principles that guide our collection policy also guide the internet access policy which states the Sacramento Public Library provides public access to the internet as part of its mission to deliver services and materials to meet the information needs of its customers. Library users in Sacramento County depend on equal access to the internet. We're witness daily to the opportunities that this access offers to them to improve their education and job skills, to find employment, and to contribute to our local economy. An open internet is not a privilege for the affluent. It is the right of each and every one of us. Internet resources must remain affordable for libraries and freely accessible to those we serve. Without this guarantee, there's a danger that libraries will face higher service charges for so-called premium access, and that could result in for-profit colleges or other commercial ventures having faster access than, say, a library or a community college. Even more devastating in my mind is a model that would take a child to a commercial service but leave behind library curated resources so that they don't have access to them. We must not allow a system of internet access in this country that would set limits on bandwidth or speed because of paid prioritized transmission. Such a scheme would only increase the gap that already exists between the haves and the have-nots. Imagine the consequences. Libraries would be forced to just turn off access to vital information for those who need it most. We cannot afford to be a society where information is available only to those with the means to purchase it. Let's prohibit paid prioritization. Let's prohibit access to websites, applications, and internet-based services and please let's provide transparency around network management. That's why I, along with the American Library Association, support legislation introduced by you, Congresswoman Matsui and Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont that would prohibit paid prioritized agreements. The internet functions best when it's open to everyone without interference by internet access providers. Paid prioritization is inherently unfair and it could be particularly harmful to libraries and educational institutions, research and learning organizations that do not have access to pay additional fees. There should be no difference in the open internet rules for wired and wireless services. We heard why this morning, the number of people simply who use only mobile devices. Technology and distinctions that would justify such a difference no longer exist if they ever did and the role of mobile services in education, research, and learning continues to expand highlighting the importance of an open internet regardless of the mode by which it is accessed. Over the last few months, we've seen that record number of people, 3.7 million Americans take time to share their voices and their opinions on the open internet proposal put forth by the FCC chairman. I believe the commission should go through the public comments carefully and develop a final net neutrality proposal that will include strong, transparent, and enforceable rules. The rules should not be allowed, should not allow unfettered access to internet traffic. The rules should allow unfettered access to internet traffic in a non-discriminatory manner to preserve the culture and the tradition of the internet as an open platform for research, education, and the exchange of information. An internet that is anything but open and equally accessible for each and every one of us isn't really an option, in my opinion. I want to thank you, Congresswoman Matsui, for your leadership on this issue and for scheduling today's forum here in Sacramento. I applaud you for your strong stance and thank you FCC commissioners Clyburn and Rosenmorsel for making the trip here and for making sure that we all have the opportunity to allow our voices to be heard. Thank you. Thank you, Rivka. Now I'd like to welcome our next witness, Chris Kelly, founder of Kelly Investments. Chris brings a wealth of experience and expertise on investing in the internet ecosystem. He's a founder of Kelly Investments, a successful venture capitalist firm that invests in internet companies and technology startups. He's also a minority owner of the Sacramento King's NBA team. Previously, Chris served as chief privacy officer and general counsel for Facebook. Like myself, Chris is also a veteran of the Clinton White House. He served as policy advisor in a White House for President Clinton's Domestic Policy Council. Thank you, Chris, for being here today. Thank you so much, Congressman Matsui, for the opportunity to come here and I'm deeply appreciative of commissioners Clyburn and Rosenmorsel for joining us as well. The story of the internet is the story of being able to reach millions of people and, importantly, to have millions of people reach you with ease and low cost. It has inspired thousands upon thousands of people, young and old, to take entrepreneurial chances that seem irrational at the time that they're made and end up transforming the world for the better. The paid prioritization that was not just possible but nearly explicitly endorsed in the first proposal by Chairman Wheeler in his first net neutrality proposal would rapidly destroy that story and threaten our economy. We're hearing from the technology industry with a single voice, both from small upstarts and those who've now built companies seen as cash cows who can afford to pay by some telecommunications providers that a real commitment to net neutrality is critical to the future of American innovation. Facebook, the company that I have the most direct experience through my service in a variety of roles from 2005 to 2009, including as general counsel, chief privacy officer and head of global public policy, would have been unlikely to grow from its college roots without the de facto net neutrality that has prevailed to this point and must continue to prevail in the future. Well, Facebook, Google, eBay, Netflix and the other targets of irresponsible telecommunications providers seeking to double-dip by charging at both ends of their internet plumbing may be able to survive. The up-and-coming upstarts that are critical to Silicon Valley's, Sacramento's and our nation's future would be deeply harmed by the innovation tax that is paid prioritization. Please assure the American people more than 3.7 million who have taken moments out of their days on what seems like an obscure technical issue to speak to the FCC. Please assure them that the FCC will stand with consumers like the kid in the dorm room or a high school student working from her parents' house with a better idea for how the internet should work and with the internet industry as a whole that you will ban paid prioritization. I've happily reinvested in the internet industry helping to build film innovator Fandor, fee-free financial services provider Loyal 3 that is helping broaden ownership in American companies and many other apps and services that simplify people's lives. Reaching people easily and quickly through the internet without having to pay an innovation tax for delivery is critical to the success of all these businesses. Abrogation of net neutrality will allow irresponsible providers to choke innovation and further entrench incumbents and their consumer hostile visions of the internet's future. As an investor in the internet ecosystem paid prioritization schemes would no doubt stifle precious capital and investment in the digital economy. We cannot allow that to happen. It's not just the technology industry responsible telecommunications providers who are endorsing the principles that we seek to protect. We're thankful that some are making explicit commitments in endorsing a meaningful and active FCC regulatory response in this area. As Washington found out when it tried to jam through SOPA and PIPA without due consideration Silicon Valley and the internet industry as a whole are ready and willing to engage in the public discourse once they understand the stakes. As a veteran of the Clinton administration where I had the pleasure of working with Congresswoman Matsui, who made his way back to Silicon Valley, I've often been frustrated by Silicon Valley's lack of focus on the policymaking process. But when that policymaking process becomes captive to entrenched interests, we've now learned to rise up quickly and effectively. I have no doubt that the poor public reaction to Chairman Wheeler's initial proposed plan has driven the 3.7 million public comments. Silicon Valley is ready to assure that net neutrality is the law of the land and we hope that the FCC's final rules later this year will see its way back to this position again. Thank you very much for inviting me to participate in this forum and I look forward to engaging with you further in the process. Thank you, Chris. I would now like to welcome our next witness, David Lowe, who's president and executive producer of KVIE, a very successful public broadcast station in Sacramento. KVIE is California's second longest running public television station, serving nearly 1.4 million households. David is KVIE's sixth president of his 55-year history. He is an Emmy Award-winning executive producer and has been nominated the last two years for station excellence. He's also the president of California Public Television. His previous experience includes roles with a startup and a publicly traded software company. Much of KVIE's program is now available online. Thank you, David, for being here today. Thank you, Congresswoman Metsui. I appreciate the opportunity to come before you today at this congressional forum on net neutrality and I also appreciate commissioners Clyburn and Rose Morsell for participating in this important forum. I've been with KVIE, the PBS station in Sacramento since 2001 and have served as president and general manager since 2008. KVIE appreciates the opportunity to share our views with this forum on this very important subject. As providers of video content with an ever-growing number of our viewers accessing our content online, it is important to us that those viewers have full unrestricted access to the wide array of educational content and services that we provide on whatever platform they wish to receive it. For more than four decades, public television stations have led the way in harnessing new technologies to deliver innovative educational content. KVIE and other local PBS stations complement on-air broadcast services by making educational and other non-commercial content and services available on IP-based platforms such as KVIE.org, PBS.org, and PBSkids.org as well as streaming video services, social media blogs, and interactive educational video games, and mobile apps. KVIE is working diligently to keep pace with the internet ecosystem and our viewer online demands. Our online KVIE videos had more than 8.2 million views through multiple portals, KVIE and PBS websites, YouTube, the PBS app for iPhone and iPad, the ALL on network, and more. Mobile viewing of KVIE.org grew from 4% to 19% in just two years. Audiences nationwide engaged with our local production, America's Heartland, online. This expanded reach has allowed people throughout the country to connect with KVIE and learn more about the people and the issues affecting the Sacramento region. No longer does someone need to live in a broadcast area to find out what is going on in other parts of the country. From children to teachers and caregivers, from career training to lifelong learners, education lies at the heart of what we do in public television. Nationwide, stations like KVIE offer hundreds of local learning initiatives for all stages of life. From the inception of public television, we have been committed and rooted in this educational mission, and so it is only natural that our online presence is largely focused on our educational impact. What began with Sesame Street over 45 years ago now encompasses a whole children's educational lineup that has reached more than 90 million children and runs from literacy to STEM to social-emotional education available anytime, anywhere for every child. What is universally free and available to every household in this nation in broadcast form is now also widely and increasingly available as online videos and as games and mobile apps can enhance the learning experience. Public television is America's largest classroom and we serve as the leading source of digital learning tools for preschool teachers and K through 12 classrooms. As classrooms become more connected, our content becomes an even more valuable teaching tool. The PBS Kids website averages more than 11 million unique visitors per month, and in 2013, more minutes were spent on children's videos on pbskids.org than any other children's site. The collection of more than 35 PBS Kids mobile apps has been downloaded more than 10 million times. Local public television stations like KVIE do all of this because of our public service mission. We are more than broadcasters. We are here to serve the communities that we are individually licensed to and address their unique needs and reflect their diversity. We don't do this for ratings. We don't do it for membership pledges. We do it for public service and the communities we serve. To be clear, KVIE and the public television industry take no specific position on the current net neutrality proposal. We make no recommendations on the regulatory scheme or authority that works best. As I mentioned earlier in my testimony, as a provider of video content with a growing number of our viewers accessing our content online, it is important to us that everyone have full, unrestricted access to the wide array of educational content and services that we provide on whatever platform they wish to receive it. We fervently hope that this panel and the FCC will appreciate that for all of the broadband innovations and services I've described today, broadcasting remains at the heart of what we do. And it's one to millions communications architecture remains an extraordinarily efficient and effective use of the spectrum we steward for the American people. We are honored to serve everyone, everywhere, every day for free using all the platforms that modern technology enables. And we are profoundly grateful for the federal funding that makes this remarkable public-private partnership possible. Thank you for the opportunity to share these thoughts and this record of service and progress with you today. Thank you, David. Now our last witness, certainly not the least, I'd like to welcome Melissa Rosenberg, a very successful Hollywood screenwriter and producer representing the Writers Guild of America West. Melissa has written all five screenplays for the vampire phenomenon, the Twilight Saga. All together, the five films have grossed over three billion dollars worldwide, making Melissa the most successful female screenwriter of all time. Yes. Melissa also spent four seasons as both head writer and executive producer of the Showtime original series Dexter. Her work on the show helped earn it the prestigious Peabody Award, three Emmy nominations, three Writers Guild of America Award nominations and two Golden Globe nominations. Melissa is currently the creator of an upcoming Marvel Netflix series set for 2015. We look forward to seeing that. Thank you, Melissa, for being here and we're waiting for your presentation. Thank you. Thank you, Congresswoman. That's an incredible honor to be here and to be born and bred California and to be in my state's capital for the first time and speaking with you is really an honor. And thank you also to the commissioners, Clyburn and Rosenwurzel. I'm in awe of what all three of you do and I aspire to be you. As you said, my name is Melissa Rosenberg. I am a screenwriter and a television writer-producer and I've made a career telling stories involving heroes and villains and occasional serial killers, but, you know, but the heroes and villains are regularly called upon to do the fantastic and sometimes even the impossible. And as a female screenwriter and a male-dominated globalized industry, I know the feeling. Also as a screenwriter who adapted the Twilight novels, I feel uniquely qualified to speak out about, to speak about media consolidation and internet public policy issues thanks to my extensive knowledge with vampires and werewolves. Sadly, the real-life story has much of the gore, excuse me, as much of the gore, but none of the romance. At the stake is the very ability of storytellers like myself to tell the stories we want to tell, to tell diverse stories that offer insight and inspiration that allow viewers to expand their understanding of other cultures and to encourage them to tap into their own imaginations to express themselves. And right now, anyone can do it. All they need is an internet connection. So this is the thrilling tale of an open internet in which the fundamental American values of free speech and fair competition are threatened by the villainy of monopoly power and corporate censorship. Where the only hope for a happy ending is the reclassification of internet access services and the successful application of net neutrality. Fortunately, there are heroes among us including Congresswoman Matsui who has proposed legislation recognizing the need to ban paid prioritization, thus presenting internet service providers, ISPs, from becoming online gatekeepers and the commissioners, David and Rosenwurzel who are doing valuable work to develop strong net neutrality rules. But there is still much drama still to come. In this story so far, the free and open internet has worked like traditional telephone lines. When consumers use a phone, they can call whomever they want. No phone company can limit whom they can reach. Likewise, consumers choose where they want to go online. An ISP doesn't decide what content has preferential access or what is regulated to a slow lane. The free market and fair competition enabled by this structure have revolutionized communication, democratic discourse, social engagement and commerce. And in the entertainment industry it has provided a surprising plot twist. After decades of consolidation, seven corporations control almost everything we see on conventional TV and movie theaters. For writers, this means they control what we create. We should be used to this. The history of media in the 20th century has a repeated course of emerging technologies with open distribution platforms which were inevitably corporatized and globalized by a small handful of conglomerates. It happened to us in motion pictures, radio, broadcast television and then cable television. But with the rise of the internet as a new platform for video distribution one where anyone can reach an audience, we have a chance to re-empower content providers. For women and people of color, especially who are underrepresented as actors, writers and directors, the open internet provides a new opportunity to participate in the creation of both our national culture as well as the global economy. This is not just a writer's fantastic vision of the future with the rapid growth of online video market, the open internet is delivering on its promises. Today, four video streaming sites make up more than half of all fixed internet traffic. In 2013, advertisers and consumers spent $6 billion on internet video services and that amount is rising. This demand has created a new market for original, professional video programming where hundreds of writer's guild members have begun to work and countless new creative voices have begun to appear. I include myself in this group as I'm currently the showrunner of an upcoming Netflix series based on a Marvel comic superhero Jessica Jones. The internet represents our greatest opportunity to reintroduce competition for what we create and what consumers can choose to watch. It's why I joined with almost 250 TV and online series creators and showrunners in a letter to the FCC Chairman Wheeler, urging him to set aside the proposal to allow ISPs to become online content gatekeepers. And more than 1200 of my fellow guild members have emailed comments to the SEC urging the commission to reclassify internet service. The SEC may continue on its outline path but this has already led to the chairman to propose a tiered internet with fast and slow lanes. This path gives the ISPs the power to put their thumb on the scale and determine market winners and losers. Allowing ISPs to push aside new competition serves neither innovation nor the best interests of our society. The free market where consumers hold the power to decide what content they prefer will be lost. There is, however, another way. It is for the commission to reclassify internet service and institute rules that ban blocking and discrimination. This is the only way to preserve a free market where consumers control access to the content services and applications of their choice. And so we arrive at the turning point of the story. Will the internet's open forum for free speech and enterprise be turned into a walled fortress of content control? Will entertainment, information, and marketing platforms be readily available to all or just those who can afford to pay for them? Will new media be dominated by the gatekeepers that dominated old media? The climax of the story is yet to be written. The policy decisions that triggered the consolidation of old media have not yet been finalized for new media. There is still time to protect the rights of content producers, entrepreneurs, and especially consumers regardless of their socioeconomic status. The FCC needs to reclassify internet access services and establish strong net neutrality rules to ensure that the internet remains a level playing field for all. The entertainment industry is filled with oxymorons from jumbo shrimp to Hollywood accounting. Allow me to add one more. If the internet is to survive as a free and open means of content and creation and market driven competition, we must win the fight for neutrality. Thanks very much. It's an honor to be here. Thank you very much Melissa for that informative and engaging presentation. Now is the time for us to ask questions here. If you can be as succinct as possible because I intend to ask every single one of you and I know to do the same. This has been wonderful and I think each of you brought something to the table which was diverse and for a lot of people unknown to a great degree. Commissioner Sandoval, you focus on a lot of things in your testimony including water and power and all of that. I wanted to ask you about the healthcare system which you touched upon. It's increasingly relying on internet enabled devices and technology and the nation is migrating to an internet of things universe. And I think one of the unintended consequences of paid prioritization is this ability to distort the market for the delivery of critical services such as healthcare. Can you briefly discuss the impact paid prioritization deals could have on a hospital systems? Thank you very much Carmen Metsui. I had the honor last week of speaking with Dr. Hogarth at the UC Davis School of Medicine who manages their telemedicine program and he gave me an example of how fast internet with high-resolution cameras is critical to the outcome and indeed the life of burn victims. So he was reporting that today through video consultations using high-resolution internet and high-speed internet and high-resolution cameras they are able to take a burn victim who might go to a rural clinic in the outer parts of Kern County where there is no burn specialist. And he said that of course a lot of burn victims are also in shock but that they're notoriously unable to describe the depth and extent of their burn but by using these internet enabled video cameras a burn specialist and surgeon is able to look at it to see the extent of the burn the color, the depth of the burn and also fluid weeping from the burn which is very important because as you lose your skin you lose fluid and so that surgeon then is able to ask the doctors to administer a certain amount of IV fluid which is absolutely critical because if this IV fluid is not administered and the person is just put on the helicopter if they make it alive to the emergency center where the burn specialist is located they will arrive in renal failure. So this intervention prevents people from that loss and it also helps a better patient outcome because they can also do at that rural hospital in outer Kern interventions that will not only save the patient's life but also result in less scarring and you also asked about how this is related to the internet of things one really important invention is now the use of smart beds in hospitals so a bed is not just something you lie on in a hospital anymore it can also take your heart rate it can take your vitals and it is also interconnected so that not only can the nurses see it but the data is aggregated through big data about smart beds and then interconnected to other firefighters to emergency services to disaster planners so that if a disaster strikes in many places in California like the king fire information is available to emergency specialists about where beds are available in which types of units throughout the state through the aggregated data made possible by smart beds and the internet of things and that invention was made possible because people recognized a bed didn't have to be just a bed it could be a diagnostic tool internet enabled it didn't have to ask any ISPs for permission about how to use their bandwidth to accomplish that Thank you Rivka sometimes I think that we including many in Washington DC take for granted the open internet that we all currently enjoy as a librarian really at the ground level serving the people in Sacramento can you talk about the importance of an open and accessible internet community rather than a system that is divided up between haves and have nots Thank you that's a wonderful question well there specifically here in Sacramento County 16% of everyone who lives here lives below the poverty line so what we're able to do as a library in providing access is priceless in my opinion and to compromise that or threaten it threatens our ability to help raise people above the access that we provide allows us to provide those services that people often don't have access to elsewhere and when I think about things like a small store online who all of a sudden would have to pay can't compete with a large store there's an impact on the retail economy there's an impact on libraries if we were shunted to a slow lane in terms of the content we're able to provide there's an impact on the innovation and the incubation that we're allowed and able to provide to our community I brought along a little tool today that was fabricated in one of our libraries using a 3D printer the prototype was done on the 3D printer because a young man heard about it and asked the library to prototype it did a Kickstarter campaign raised $70,000 and is now retailing these items that's the spirit of innovation that that free and open access provides and I would hate to see that compromised thank you Rivka Chris Kelly in your testimony you stated that pay partization amounts to attacks on innovation I agree if you're starting a new business or a startup in Sacramento or Silicon Valley and pay partization with the law of the land how would that impact your ability to attract capital and investment and ultimately the success of that small startup or business small business it makes it a huge challenge because it adds a further layer of things that as an investor you have to evaluate or as an entrepreneur that you need to try to cover the pain to investors how you're going to relate to getting quick internet access especially if you rely upon if you're talking about any sort of higher bandwidth business where you want to provide reviews of local restaurants for instance through video if you had a video demand at that point the first question in the investment discussion would be about what's your relationship with the ISPs that you actually can get to the consumers at the end of the day distribution is the coin of the realm in internet businesses and if you have to add another question about how you get distribution capital is going to freeze up fairly quickly essentially it should just be a given you shouldn't have to think about it then you don't right now that possibility of reaching millions of consumers right away and having that potential and with paid prioritization it could go away pretty quickly thank you David from the perspective of a public broadcaster with limited financial resources if pay for priority scheme or in place would it add to the difficulties of growing KVIE's online presence as I mentioned as an industry we don't have a position on the proposal it's a huge issue and we're still working through our processes but certainly as a not for profit broadcaster we're always focused on our funding in addition to serving our public mission so we believe that our content should be available for everybody in the most accessible way thank you David Melissa millions of Americans are now watching their favorite television shows or movies online whether it's Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hulu, YouTube and so forth because of the internet your great work writing some of our favorite shows and movies are available anytime, anywhere with a touch of a screen I understand you're working on this new series, a Marvel Comics series for Netflix which relies solely on a high speed broadband internet for delivery of the content can you speak about how pay for priority schemes would impact the abilities by you or any other creative talents to use the internet as a platform to get their content distributed how about the consumers who go online to look for programming how will their choices be affected or distorted well we've certainly seen it in previous models of broadcast television and film and if you want to see the sequel number 7 to that last superhero you know it's getting narrow and narrow the diversity there is predominantly male and predominantly white and I think that is such a huge part of what my passion for this issue is to really bring all stories to it so if the internet rules are where all data and content are created equally in the playing field and consumers decide what they want to watch it's not a board room of predominantly white male people put it out like oh yes everybody wants to see what that 13 year old boy wants to see which is how the movie business has turned into what it is by the way um that's why I work on TV right now so allowing paid fast lanes will undermine the fundamental what's made the internet so great at the moment requiring companies to pay for faster access will reduce investment in content and seed all power to companies that can afford to pay and that means fewer outlets and less content the return of the father of the son of superhero number XYZ thank you Melissa I found it very interesting and I think it's very true that this has opened the door for younger people women minorities in a way that they had difficulty accessing to be able to be a screenwriter or to be able to do creative things very much so I see that in my business all the time people who are getting rejected at the broadcast networks or film studios because they seemingly are oh that's going to play that's just for a black audience so that's not big enough for that so that person goes creates that content online creates a show viewers and you go back to the broadcast and suddenly they're chasing the broadcast is chasing them now and it just expands it and it takes off the narrow binders of what's going to sell who are the audience and what's going to sell because it's just people expressing who they are and expressing their stories I think it's essential for viewers to view it myself I feel very strongly about it Thank you Melissa Commissioner Clyburn Thank you and since you're speaking Ms. Rosenberg I just wanted to let you know I'm still in theory before my first few Dexter episodes You'll be glad to know my 12 of my family are shrinks as well so thanks for that too I'm not sure what the ethics rules are but I might need to talk to you so I wanted to affirm something that you said that I feel real strongly about in terms of what an enabler this platform has been I had an opportunity to have a meeting with Issa Ray who's just remarkable talent that to be honest I wish I could see more her content as I flip through the screens and pay a couple of dollars for a movie but I wanted to talk to you or address in sort of two-part sort of semi-unrelated questions about how for these newer writers you know how the dynamics have truly changed and you mentioned that and what is your goal and wish for them and you talked about that but when you talk about the proper application of open internet rules when we talk about it to wireless from wireless perspective and when I mentioned those the number of persons migrating on that wireless platform does that influence the way writers and the way creators approach things and you know what does this all mean and it's particularly as it relates to you know what we talk about you know priority arrangements tell me you know I'm asking you but it all kind of you're a writer so I don't worry about you distilling and flowing because there's by that therapy though I'll get a referral okay thank you so you're talking about the wireless versus the broader and knowing that you know oftentimes when there's an online engagement there's populations that rely strictly on this what does that mean for writers is it a positive is it a negative what is it you know it's well first of all pretty much every young person I know and my industry is full of them and you know that so but what's true for us is a story is story there is no difference whatsoever you tell a story and how it gets viewed the only thing that might matter is if you're actually aiming for a cell phone movie you might not do you know gone with the wind with a scene where and then Atlanta burns you know might not play on a cell phone but other than that a story is a story it does not matter where it plays or how it plays whether it be wireless or broad vendor or you know anywhere else okay and Mr. Low I know you're not taking a position but I'm wondering if there are any currents continuing on the mobile theme you talked about you know your platform and how more people are you know going and consuming you know online I'm wondering if you have any concerns to address or anything you would like for us to consider as it relates particularly again on mobile being the most available in whatever platform is at the foundation of what we do so PBS is available to almost 100% of all Americans for free because of our broadcast services and the more that our video is consumed online we believe that also needs to be available in the most universally accessible way and you know Mr. Kelly you've answered this and thank you Congresswoman for taking my question but that's okay we like you anyway you know what elements do we need to you know consider as it relates to you know investors talk about certainty you know that's your refrain and so what types of in terms of policies what are the say three to five key elements that need to be present in order to make sure that you are open for business and open for engagement well I mean I think that primarily the focus on barring paid prioritization is the number one through five things that the canon should be done in this area because that additional uncertainty that matches with the business model with you know outreach efforts with the entrepreneurs that you're dealing with you know individually their skills that the networks that they have personally you know adding the how's your relationship with the ISP to actually get the distribution it would be a radical change in how things operate I mean we at Facebook when I joined we had about two million people on our platform largely through university broadband services if we'd had to go out and negotiate with every ISP America to get Facebook access on people's phones or in their homes that would have been a huge disincentive to the investment in Facebook by others and would have been a huge distraction from the building of the service and the innovation in terms of newsfeed and all the different things that the companies provide understood and a commissioner one we often work together as you mentioned as federal state partners tell me how that partnership needs to continue to be enhanced when we talk about maintaining a free and open internet well thank you very much so you know first of all I think it's also to understand the role of the state commissions and to collaborate so commissioner Clybert of course has had the honor of also being a state commissioner and the duty of also supervising energy and water utilities as well as other common carriers and telephone corporations that have a statutory duty of safety and reliability so I think understanding what it means to regulate these other industries that are critical industries that have safety duties and standards really is very important to understanding this because if the internet is not reliable then it's undermined so and a couple of quick examples so I talked about lifeline so with lifeline in California in January the CPC unanimously reformed and modernized our lifeline program to include access to mobile so I had the honor of being the assigned commissioner in the lifeline proceeding and we were very concerned that many Americans throughout the country were running out of minutes because the federal lifeline program has no minimum number of minutes so we decided that you know for California to be willing to put its money there and we pay the equivalent of what we pay for wireless for wire line the lifeline and we decided that the wireless provider would have to offer at least a thousand minutes a month to be eligible for the maximum payment from California's own fund which is $12.65 so California is paying more than the federal government and what this has resulted in is a subsidy of up to $22.50 and a tribal area is plus another $25 given their remoteness for the lifeline. This is why now we are enrolling at least 30,000 people a month in lifeline and the way that people are being enrolled is that the carriers the companies who are approved to participate are often going out to fairs they're in places where people congregate they're at libraries and they're sitting there with mobile devices to be able to input the people's information upload through the cloud they can also use this to be able to scan and take pictures of documents so that then the documents can get uploaded as well through our internet enabled system so that we can verify income eligibility we are the only state doing 100% income verification and in fact I wanted to thank the FCC for collaborating with us on developing your own lifeline database which was largely modeled after California so the investments that have been made on the private side to enable that on the public side on the state side all of our work is absolutely critical and understanding how mobile platforms are useful to that verification plus how they enable new services the last thing I'll say in that is one of the things that we're able to imagine now with this internet mobile enabled world is that we just unanimously adopted in our CARE program California Alternative Rates for Energy and ESAP Energy Savings Assistance Program where California spends in the course of three years more than $5 billion to support energy affordability for low income people and to provide energy efficiency measures in the home so one of the things that I put in the order and my colleagues unanimously adopted is that we asked the utilities to work with lifeline providers and other utilities to develop their ESAP mobile app and this is something that I ideated at a hackathon where I helped initiate an apps for energy hackathon that then became the model for the DOE American Energy Data Challenge Hackathon and I'm very proud to say that last month SDG&E was the first utility to create a mobile app that will allow people to be able to apply for CARE and ESAP through an app and it will save the utility money it will save rate payers money and it will help get people the assistance that they need and it will help save California energy so that we don't have to build fossil fuel polluting power plants. Thank you. And I know I'm out of time so I wanted this to be a lightning round Dingle inspired question so how can it for all you mentioned rule call completion in that too so maybe you can weave that quickly into this answer but how can the FCC ensure that open internet rules protect all consumers including most vulnerable consumers such as lower income populations and individuals with disabilities. I don't if you've had something and I'll speak I'll start with you commissioner and if you could weave in how you see the open internet rules once again in terms of rule call completion if you could weave that in that quickly because the general lady is being very kind but I know she's I can feel. Thank you very much that's an important question because the FCC's MPRM doesn't even mention the impact on other common carriers or for example in TTY the only place that TTY is mentioned is at the very end if you search for TTY it tells you how you can get a copy of the MPRM but it doesn't actually contemplate what would be the impact of this proposal on the deaf and disabled who are making calls. So for rule call completion issues part of the question is that as you know commissioner you led when you were acting chairman and all of you unanimously adopted an order to help to stop rule call completion problems and impose obligations on everyone, VOIP providers, intermediaries, telephone corporations everyone to make sure that calls got through. So pay prioritization and negotiations that could result in hold-ups at the server level that you don't even know about could interfere with the duty to terminate common carrier calls and right now when there are fires raging through California there are evacuations there are reverse 911 calls that is more important than ever and last I would submit to you if you look at the Comcast users form there are people who are complaining that during the dispute with cogent over Netflix that they were having problems not only getting League of Legends but that they also were having problems getting certain VOIP services and when you look up those VOIP services those are interconnected VOIP services that have 911 and E911 obligations. So the concern that we have may have already happened. So this is an issue that I am asking our commission to follow up on and I suggest I respectfully suggest that the Public Communications Commission consider as well. Thank you. You are in a unique position seeing all consumers so if you would weigh in I would appreciate it. As far as I am concerned the most important thing that you can do is eliminate any discussion of paid prioritization. I know this comes I know the whole issue of net neutrality is not new I remember that we had this discussion about 8 years ago because if you if John Oliver didn't educate us all this time ASCA Ninja did in 2006 so I want to just bring us back to in 2014 our issues haven't changed as librarians and we need to know that we can provide equal access to everybody we serve and the content has to be we have to be able to provide content and the platform has to be neutral. Thank you. Mr. Kelly I know you don't see where you might logically weigh in but if you could weigh in including the assertion by some that paid prioritization might actually help startups compete with larger and more established competitors I know you might disagree with that position but if you could weigh that in as we Yeah I do disagree with it because it then you know the wrong thing at that point you know what startups are supposed to be doing is serve under certain populations figure out how to aggregate them you know and build business models around that instead you're building business models around you know fast access and instead of you know instead of thinking about how you know people are going to be able to be empowered and innovate and it actually connects as well to your last question about serving under certain communities because you know access is the key factor for allowing all of these different populations to get online express themselves, build their own businesses and outreach ability we just have an incredible challenge in terms of allowing people access to the interconnect connectivity which is critical to operating you know we can serve massive numbers of people in underserved populations by making sure that everybody has the same access There are still a number of attendant issues along with net neutrality that we're working on as an industry and understanding through our process but certainly we would like to reach and serve as many people as possible in as many ways as possible so people get what they want when they want it And last but not least For me this is so important what you're doing now and just you know understanding that everyone has a story to tell and whether their professionals will get paid for it or the kid who just came out of high school every person in this room has a story to tell and to narrow the opportunity for them to do that is to damage our cultural discourse to limit our perspective of the world understanding of our fellow Americans so you are doing it already you're hearing that content providers, storytellers could be limited by any rules on this and we want just open access to be able to for everyone to tell their stories Thank you and Congresswoman Commissioner thank you so very much for being so generous and well over five minutes Commissioner Thank you Mr. Kelly let's not name names but are there some big prominent websites we all know or applications we all use today that you don't think could have gotten started in a world with paid prioritization I happily already outlined the Facebook issue obviously we had special cases access to direct university broadband for our early adopters but as Facebook expanded it would have been an incredible challenge to have to go through these negotiations with major telecommunications providers and our product team would have had to get involved in it we would have had to think about a whole bunch of different issues that could have derailed the massive innovation that we've seen that's now moving more than a billion people worldwide that challenge is something that startups shouldn't be thinking about most of the time they should be thinking about how do we develop great products that interact and connect with people through this open internet and allow the people themselves on the other side to decide how much time they want to spend on them as Facebook has expanded and has networked the world and serves an active identity layer on the internet people have chosen to use it and people have chosen to protest against it and people have chosen to do a whole bunch of different things and use this expression tool it is hard to see the type of penetration that it would have if we had had to go through deep negotiations with every telecom provider every time to figure out how we're going to actually get to users who are demanding use of the product it's a it's just something that startups shouldn't be focused on and if we allow gatekeepers to make those choices you're stifling what consumers are already demonstrating by their use of networks Mr. Lowe I am one of those original Sesame Street kids that I grew up with Big Bird and friends but my kids they're digital natives their world is not only broadcasting they access a lot of PBS programming with my permission online so we're very familiar in my household with pbskids.org and all of your apps and my question for you is do you worry that in a world of paid prioritization that could really raise your costs your effectiveness and the number of kids you could reach I'm glad to hear that you're using those apps and there's another one you should use if you don't already it's called Supervision and it's an app that you can use to monitor their screen time because they shouldn't be using that much screen time they really need to go out and play as well but I do hope that when they are using screen time it is educational content like Sesame Street Superwide, Curious George and the many others you know as I mentioned there are a lot of issues around net neutrality with paid prioritization pay to play, open platform, those kinds of things and again for us those are really big issues that as an industry we're trying to make sure that we understand and work through our process but certainly as nonprofit broadcasters focused on providing the best public service possible funding is always a challenge and we're constantly focused on serving our mission and making sure that we have the funds to do so so anything else that distracts us from that Ms. Sass you know that I'm a big fan and champion of the E-Rate Program which helps bring high speed connectivity to all of our nation's schools and libraries and I think one of the neat things about that connectivity is in libraries it's being used for education in so many ways and online education is growing in some ways that's for a local student who wants to brush up on some of the things they're learning at school it's for people as you mentioned who've fallen through the cracks and might be getting their GED and it's for workforce education too which I'll submit is only going to grow more important in the years ahead so I'm worried that paid prioritization would have an impact on the ability of library patrons to use those educational resources what do you think well I absolutely agree with you currently the library subscribes to about 40 different electronic resources that do everything from online tutoring to help children and adults complete a course we offer foreign language instruction through Rosetta Stone we offer any number of resources if paid prioritization becomes the priority for us then that limits our ability to provide access to those resources and our community which 15% of which doesn't have a high school diploma 16% of which lives below the poverty line to access those resources so it's incredibly important that we be able to continue providing access to as broad an array of content that as we can and not be relegated to the slow lane Ms. Rosenberg as we can tell from your testimony you're one of those creative types we could use you in Washington jazz up some of our hearings but for me I'm a consumer and the thing that strikes me is in the past several years the explosion of platforms that I can get content on is tremendous as writers but it's also terrific for us as consumers and I worry in a world where paid prioritization becomes the norm that that explosion would cease and we wouldn't find that many more new platforms would develop what do you think? Absolutely I think up until this explosion outside of traditional broadcast all of those were focusing on what story to tell that will sell versus what story do we want to tell what story is it, what's important an important story to tell and then it started expanding into cable and now you have Netflix and YouTube and Hulu and Amazon Prime and there's all these places where you can tell story and it's an extraordinarily exciting time right now for viewers as well I have a hard time keeping up with all these incredible, it's really the rebirth of the storytelling in film to entertainment I think it's very interesting because film was movies were the lead on all of this and that was the you always wanted to be a big screenwriter people are now, they want to go create something on the web they want to go and tell what is the goal, if you go to a film school that's the goal because they can do what they want to do and it just makes for amazing viewing it's such an exciting time and I really to stifle that would be just creatively a disaster I think I agree from what is just watching last but not least you know what I loved at the start of your testimony you talked about public safety the impact of network neutrality and its relationship with public safety is something that we have not discussed enough in Washington and in your role as a state commissioner you're closer to a lot of essential infrastructure, you're closer to the ground and I'd love to hear you talk a little bit more about that thank you very much thank you so much for your commitment to public safety I know that you make it a priority to visit public safety answering points wherever you go and I would note that this proposal does not even exempt public safety answering points and it is critical that everybody be able to reach public safety answering points so let me answer your question in part by telling you how a blackout works so in California we don't have brownouts we only have blackouts so the power is either on or it's off and when you have brownouts you can actually fry computers and devices and I have seen computers fried by poor power so when the Santa Nuclea power plant went out after a small leak on January 31st of 2012 Southern California an area where 26 million people live in one minute lost 20% of their power alright so over time Southern California Edison primary operator of that plant along with the city of Riverside and San Diego Gas and Electric identified four particular substations electric substations in Orange County as most at risk because they were closer to the Santa Nuclea power plant and all of San Diego County and it's keeping in mind that we're talking about the place that hosts the second largest city in America which is actually served by LADWP and it's surrounding region which is bigger than the city of Los Angeles and another one of the top 10 cities in America, San Diego alright so the system was designed so that having lost 20% of the power we had to call on every resource and get absolutely created about what we were going to do and demand response was absolutely critical and what was important is that this you had to be able to get load to power down if you were in a situation where demand was too high and you didn't have enough resources because you had 20% that you had just lost for your power. So a couple of things happened. One the utilities have now had programs for years which they're expanding which do auto communication to interuptable load for example there's a little device that could be put on your outside return for your air conditioner and if demand is too high the utility sends a signal to it and it basically turns down your air conditioner and reduces demand on the grid alright so there are a number of those types of things that work on what we call auto DR another important part of component of DR is communication to people to get people to act because people can also opt out of those auto DR situations including their thermostats so mobile has been absolutely critical to that as the utilities tweet email, Facebook use a number of call use a number of different means text to be able to ask people to power down and what happened in 2012 as we knew that these four particular substations were most at risk is that the system was set up so that if demand was too high in order to prevent a cascading power failure that would black out not only SE territory but all of a sudden California and a bad cascade can continue as it did we've already had a blackout when somebody made a mistake in Arizona and it managed to black out not only Imperial County but all of San Diego and northern Mexico so these four power plants these four substations basically were set up and the system was alarmed so that if power demand was too high and demand response did not come through load wasn't reduced then it was set up so that they could press a button and go ahead and enable the system you can enable the time so as I recall and maybe a little off about the numbers but basically if demand wasn't reduced within 15 minutes then the first substation would be blacked out hospitals, PSAPs police stations universities everything blacked out four substations can be blacked out if demand isn't lowered and if that doesn't stabilize the system then the next substation would be blacked out hospitals, PSAPs, police stations universities everything blacked out four substations can be blacked out and if that doesn't stabilize the system then it grows alright so we never had to get to that point of actually having blacked out because of coordination and because the California independent system operator says that there was one day in particular in San Diego where demand response made the difference between blacked out or not but there was one day when Southern California Edison alarmed the system they never had to push the button they never had to go and BR is part of what's going to keep us from getting there thank you that's alarming that is and first of all I want to thank you everyone here for being here in the audience and looking at this and I'd like to thank the witnesses you were so good each and every one of you bringing in your particular viewpoints I just thought it was really remarkable and thank you so much I want to thank everybody here I want to particularly want to thank my commissioners Rosen Warsaw and Clyburn who are absolutely wonderful to work with and I also want to let you know that we are going to be sharing all this information obviously it's on Official Record of Energy and Commerce Committee and also the FCC but I also feel that personally I want to share this with the Energy and Commerce Chairman and Ranking Members Fred Upton and Henry Waxman and also the Communications and Technology Chairman and Ranking Members Greg Walden and Anna Eshoo because all of us are very much engaged and interested in it and I believe that this is particularly important because we are actually doing this outside of the Beltway and engaging people who really feel the importance of this individuals who actually engage other people in their various businesses or the roles that librarians or public broadcasters or writers and you all bring a particular perspective that is valuable because when you talk about people talk about net neutrality a lot of people don't understand that it really impacts every single person whoever you are so I do hope that the Chairman takes these testimonies to heart and with the commissioners here really work to restore net neutrality rules that will protect both consumers and innovators and encourage broadband investment and deployment and most importantly really continue to foster a healthy internet ecosystem I really want to thank you all for being here there's a historic opportunity here I've never seen the FCC as engaged it has been recently because it's important things have really changed in the last couple of years I remember when Tivo was a big deal remember you know we can actually watch it whenever you want to watch it now it's just everything is so exciting now and it's important that we make sure that the internet is there for the future I want to also thank Access Sacramento for providing the streaming online here for all of us and they're absolutely wonderful here too and yes and thank you all we let this hearing go a little bit longer because I thought it was important to really engage the witnesses in the manner that many times we can't engage in Washington DC so thank you so much and I'd like to declare that this hearing is adjourned