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Netflix reportedly will pay about $100 million to stream every episode of Mad Men: chump change, if predictions of an $800 million streaming TV market turn out to be true. Also, it seems that everyone wants to get in on the tablet market, but given reported XOOM sales of only about 100,000, it's possible the only tablet market there is is for iPads. Plus, AT&T iPhones and their dropped calls, and Obama goes to Facebook. -- Molly

Links from Wednesday's episode of Loaded:

Republicans in the House of Representatives are working to stop Net neutrality regulations

President Obama will take to Facebook for a town-hall meeting on April 20

Facebook wants to compete with sites like FlackList and ProfNet to connect journalists with sources and stories

Twitter may launch branded pages

Sprint launches a 3G/4G Mi-Fi for $79

Dish Network plans to scoop up beleaguered Blockbuster for just $228 million

Microsoft shifts the focus of Hohm from the home to the car

Correction 4:50 p.m. PT: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said the House adopted a resolution blocking Net neutrality regulations. It approved procedures for voting on the resolution. The headline and story have been changed to reflect that. Also, the story misstated the state Rep. Jared Polis represents. He represents Colorado.

House Republicans moved today to prevent controversial Net neutrality regulations from taking effect, a move that is likely to invite an eventual confrontation with President Obama.

By an almost entirely partisan vote of 241 to 178, the House of Representatives approved procedures for voting on a … Read more

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has thrown out Verizon and MetroPCS' suits challenging the Federal Communications Commission's new Net neutrality rules.

The appeals court said in its order today that the suits filed in January by Verizon Communications and MetroPCS were premature. Specifically, the court said that Verizon and MetroPCS needed to wait until the FCC's Net neutrality rules are posted to the Federal Register before they could file their suits.

The suits, which the broadband providers filed separately, accused the FCC of overstepping its jurisdiction in adopting new rules that would … Read more

EMC said today that it has acquired NetWitness, which provides network security software.

The purchase, which won't impact EMC's revenue or earnings in 2011, was closed on April 1. NetWitness will be included in EMC's RSA unit.

Terms of the deal weren't disclosed.

With the acquisition, EMC will delve deeper into network security monitoring and analysis. NetWitness aims to spot everything from insider threats to target malware to data leakage.

On the product front, NetWitness will become part of RSA's advanced security management lineup, which includes EnVision, RSA's Data Loss Prevention Suite and CyberCrime … Read more

Despite arriving a week later, Firefox 4 is outpacing Internet Explorer 9 in real-world use so far, new statistics show.

Microsoft released IE9 on March 14, and Mozilla's Firefox 4 arrived on March 22--both brand-new even by the fast-moving standards of today's software market. By month's end, IE9 accounted for 1.0 percent of browsing activity worldwide, according to statistics from analytics firm Net Applications. Firefox 4, though, reached 1.7 percent, despite its later start.

Firefox 4 has a big advantage in usage statistics over IE9: Windows XP. Mozilla's browser works on the decade-old operating … Read more

Microsoft has officially released its new Windows Home Server 2011.

With the release to manufacturing, Windows Home Server 2011 is now slated to reach MSDN and TechNet subscribers in early April where they can download the software via their subscriptions. The latest version should also start to pop up on computers in May, according to Microsoft, which said that manufacturers have already been working with the new home operating system.

The official version of Windows Home Server 2011, codenamed Vail, comes almost a year after the beta was released and close to two months since the release candidate made its debut.… Read more

Does your electric toothbrush access the Internet? Probably not (yet). It's a far different story with your PC, though. With so many programs going online, it's hard to stay safe, but security begins with knowledge. ProcNetMonitor is a free tool that's easier to use than to pronounce. It monitors your system's network activity and displays a list of apps that access networks. It also displays the open network port and active connection of each process it monitors, with a color-coded report that shows what's going on at a glance. Its Port Finder feature lets you … Read more

AUSTIN, Texas--U.S. Sen. Al Franken wants tech savvy entrepreneurs to keep pushing Congress to protect Net neutrality.

Franken (D-Minn.), a comedy writer, author, and radio talk show host turned senator, spoke to attendees at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival (SXSW) conference here today where he urged them contact their representatives in Congress and let them know that protecting a free and open Internet is important. He also wants this community of creative business people to attend rallies and do all they can to raise awareness of the issue.

In his speech, he railed against big broadband service providers, … Read more