Hearing of the Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee

Federal News Service February 26, 2004 Thursday

Copyright 2004 Federal News Service, Inc.
Federal News Service

February 26, 2004 Thursday

LENGTH: 29118 words

HEADLINE: HEARING OF THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS AND THE INTERNET SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE HOUSE ENERGY AND COMMERCE COMMITTEE

SUBJECT: H.R. 3717: THE BROADCAST DECENCY ENFORCEMENT ACT OF 2004

CHAIRED BY: REPRESENTATIVE FRED UPTON (R-MI)

LOCATION: 2123 RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING, WASHINGTON, D.C.

WITNESSES: ALEX WALLAU, PRESIDENT, ABC TELEVISION NETWORK;

GAIL BERMAN, PRESIDENT OF ENTERTAINMENT, FOX BROADCASTING COMPANY;

DR. ALAN WURTZEL, PH.D., PRESIDENT, RESEARCH AND MEDIA DEVELOPMENT, NATIONAL BROADCASTING COMPANY;

LOWELL "BUD" PAXSON, CHAIRMAN AND CEO, PAXSON COMMUNICATIONS CORPORATION;

JOHN HOGAN, PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, CLEAR CHANNEL RADIO;

HARRY J. PAPPAS, CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, PAPPAS TELECASTING COMPANIES

BODY:
REP. FRED UPTON (R-MI): Good morning. If we could just shut those doors in the back we'd be thankful. My good friend Ed Markey is on the way, and he has sent word that we could start, knowing that he will probably be here before the opening statements are over. So with that, we will get started.

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REP. UPTON: Mr. Shimkus.

REP. JOHN SHIMKUS (R-IL): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Timing is everything. I happen to have with me Brooke Coplersher (ph) who is a 18-year-old student from Olney, Illinois, with the Youth Leadership Conference and it would be interesting, if she was up here asking the questions or have as a panelist as we talk about the media and how we try to get control of the public airwaves.

When I get to the opportunity to ask questions, I will ask each of you to comment on your deployment of your own network .kids.us site which is a project that we've been working on this committee to see how well you have investigated and attempted to deploy the worldwide Web in a child-friendly environment to make sure that kids who want to have information on your network programs can do so on a safe and a friendly environment. That will give you time to turn back to your hired guns and find out what the heck Shimkus is talking about.

But I would hope that you would look at that as a way to really address the issue of how we do another aspect of protection of kids which is truly deploy the .kids.us child-friendly site on the worldwide Web. We think it can be of great help in making sure another tool for parents in keeping kids safe on another medium.

We've been through this now. Again, this is three times. We look forward to questions. The voice of the public has spoken. We will move. There are probably gaps in the legislation which I hope we will address. But I think what's important for me now is that we do so in a way that's constitutionally sound, that will not get bogged down in the courts and we can reclaim the airwaves.

And the other thing that I hope that additional riders which may be proposed that might not make a truly bipartisan bill which could occur as this thing moves through the process does not also occur. I think the problem is clear. It's identifiable. The public is engaged and we should move. So, Mr. Chairman, again, let's continue to work forward. I thank you for this time.

REP. UPTON: Thank you.

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REP. UPTON: The member from Illinois, Mr. Shimkus.

REP. SHIMKUS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I gave everyone a heads up at the opening statement, so I'm going to follow up and we'll just go down the table. Mr. Wallau-is that pronounced right? I'm Shimkus, so I get butchered all the time, so. What is ABC Television's response and receptiveness to the .kids.us website?

MR. WALLAU: We are engaged in a process working with the website and we will have content on the website by mid-April.

REP. SHIMKUS: Thank you.

Ms. Berman, the mother of two 11 year old twins?

MS. BERMAN: Boy and a girl.

REP. SHIMKUS: I have an 11 year old son. So what's the great Fox Broadcasting Company going to do with the .kids.us website?

MS. BERMAN: We think it's a good idea to provide a safe haven on the web and we will definitely look into it, sir. I can also let you know that our website has a very interesting part of it which informs parents of the use of the V-Chip and informs parents about the ratings system and what each rating means. And I think it's very important as more and more people and individuals and youngsters are surfing the web.

REP. SHIMKUS: Thank you.

Mr. Wurtzel.

MR. WURTZEL: Well, to be fair, this is the first I've heard of it, but I think --

REP. SHIMKUS: That's why I asked.

MR. WURTZEL: But honestly I think that I would commend you and the other members who have put forth a website, or at least an initiative to try to have a safe harbor within the internet space. That's something that we would absolutely consider partnering with. Candidly, we have a "More You Know" website and also the nbc.com website is also very family --

REP. SHIMKUS: Yes, and I'm going to talk over the different provisions, but a commitment to look and try to deploy would be well- received I think from this committee.

Mr. Paxson.

MR. PAXSON: For approximately four years we've offered our viewers PAXWAY which is an access to the Internet which is family friendly, which filters all things that the parents really don't want their children to see. We have thousands of members who utilize that service and we want to obviously look and see how we compare this service, which we are trying to add more and more people to on a daily basis on a commercial-for a commercial reason-how we might interact with that concept, and we'll get back to you because, as Mr. Wurtzel, I'm not that familiar with it actually.

REP. SHIMKUS: I would have hoped that you would have been more, based upon our discussion previously, because I think it's just what you are trying to do.

Mr. Hogan.

REP. MARKEY: Would the gentleman yield just briefly?

REP. SHIMKUS: I will, yes, sir.

REP. MARKEY: It's just to say that, for the panelists on the stand, that was a bipartisan bill.

REP. SHIMKUS: I was going to get to that.

REP. MARKEY: And there's no disagreement and any help you give us I think would be very much appreciated by all the members of this committee. And I thank the gentleman for his --

REP. UPTON: If the gentleman will yield further, I just want to underscore that as well. Dot kids is important to all of us here in lots of ways, whether we're dads and moms or certainly members of this subcommittee and, as I told the gentleman from Illinois, we intend to have an oversight hearing on the progress of where we're at before the next month is out, is my goal. And we're all working, at least in my office-actually have an upton.kids, work with our ISP here on the Hill. I applaud the gentleman's leadership, yield back.

REP. SHIMKUS: Thank you.

Mr. Hogan.

MR. HOGAN: Certainly that is something that we can endorse and that we will be sharing with our individual managers of the websites.

REP. SHIMKUS: Mr. Pappas.

MR. PAPPAS: It's a fine initiative.

REP. SHIMKUS: I would also respectfully ask that maybe you could have your folks here in DC maybe come by my office and keep me updated on your progress, especially as we move to the hearing that the Chairman has promised. The Washington Post, and I'm not a daily reader of that, but they did an article on February 20th that just talked about firms ignore kid-only Internet demand, and I ask, Mr. Chairman, for unanimous consent that this article be submitted for the record. And in there I'm quoted and I say, "The reality is I have to get more engaged and keep pushing if we"-and when I said "we" that's the committee and really the intent to be-I have to keep pushing for it to be successful, and those who follow the committee know that now I'm a one-trick pony on this issue right now. But it also says, "No dot kid websites are dedicated to soccer, dinosaurs, cartoons and other topics dear to kids' hearts." And so I would encourage folks to go through it.

"The other sites must meet strict content restrictions that bar sexuality, violence and profanity. They are not permitted to gather information from visitors, nor are they allowed to include chat rooms or links to sites outside of kids.us." And that's the key. You might have a dot org, you might have a dot com. What we try to do is make sure kids aren't exploited on the World Wide Web, so you can't hyperlink out, you can't establish chat rooms. So I think if you really take a good review of what is offered on this site, I think in addressing the protection of kids-my kids now are starting to gravitate to the World Wide Web. It scares me to death. And I'd like to see harrypotter.kids.us. And it's the chicken and the egg debate. Twelve sites up, what kid is going to go surf the kids.us site?

So it might take a little risk, it might take some adventuresome-to get your children appropriate material, identified for kids, but again, as the ranking member and the Chairman has said, if you do, I think it will help us-great ways of helping clean up the Internet, and directing kids to child-appropriate programs and shows that you're broadcasting. We all know the inappropriate stuff. There is some appropriate stuff out there and we ought to direct appropriate age kids and viewers to those sites. Let's make .kids.us one of the ways. Thank you for agreeing to keep us updated. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for calling a hearing on that, and I look forward to working with you. I yield back my time.

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