Safe Internet Alliance

[This is the seventh in a series of posts featuring key points and issues discussed at Safe Internet Alliance’s event on Capitol Hill on October 20th, “Framework For A Safe Internet: Know the facts, understand the issues, shape the future.”]

Delivering a lunchtime keynote address, Representative Marsha Blackburn, who represents Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District, said that she has an enormous creative community in her district and when it comes to issues like net neutrality and universal broadband, her main concern is protecting intellectual property.

"Tennessee is one of our largest creators of TV cable programming," she said. "We have our eyes turned astutely to what's happening with the Internet. Knowing the facts and understanding the issues are vitally important, because not everything ends up being or doing what it sounds like. We want to make certain that as we educate those we work with, that we do indeed understand the issues in order to make certain that we have a good future, not only for broadband and the Internet, but also for the innovative community that's going to come up with new applications. and also for the creative community that is going to develop the content that's going to be deployed on this."

Blackburn called network neutrality the "Fairness Doctrine of the Internet," referencing the now-abolished FCC policy that the airwaves give equal time to different political viewpoints.

"What I have realized is that many in our business community, they fully understand what the Fairness Doctrine would be, and what they do not want is the federal government policing with how they're going to deploy their content on the Internet," she said. "They want to make certain that they have the ability to deploy that content in the manner in which they negotiate with their ISP. They do not want a czar of the Internet telling them when they're going to be able to enjoy that expansion, or when they'll be able to deploy their creativity on the Internet. They don't want a czar to tell them what speeds are available. We are watching what is happening at the FCC very closely, as it relates to that issue."

Blackburn noted that every day, more of our GDP is based on creative property. With copyright issues claiming a significant stake in our economic growth, she said we should be spending more time focused on protecting those intellectual property rights, specifically in battling Internet piracy.

"We need to be very mindful of that," she said. "If we're not going to be judicious of our intellectual property, we are hitting ourselves in our nation's pocketbook. About 11% of our nation's GDP last year was due to intellectual property."

Blackburn also addressed how the FCC should go about regulation.

"We should approach technology not as how do we punish, and how do we impede, but how do we encourage innovation. And that I think is going to need to be a key thought as we move forward with a broad broadband map."