network

On Super Bowl Sunday, Domino's Pizza is planning to deliver millions of pizzas (it estimates that a total of 11 million slices will be delivered) and 2.5 million chicken wings. According to Domino's execs, the national game day gorge has become more than just a manner of beefing up on drivers, dough tossers, and yes, beef -- it's also quite an undertaking in the information technology department.

According to the Michigan-based company, a third of Domino's orders come though a digital channel these days, and of course even the analog orders run through the corporate network. In 2007, for the first time, Domino's saw the need to put together a game day "defense" team on Big Game day to sit in a conference room and keep an eye on all the information systems. … Read more

The cloud may be the future of all things storage, but the present is more complicated: it can be expensive, potentially insecure, and you're left trusting a third party with all your data.

That's what inspired The Transporter, a Kickstarter project started by former employees of Drobo. Transporter aims for something more secure and distributed, while still being sharable. The concept largely works like Dropbox, with a Transporter folder that lives on your desktop and syncs with files stored on the physical Transporter drive (which resides someplace you designate). You can easily give others access to specific folders, … Read more

The Consumer Electronics Association, a trade organization that represents 2,000 technology companies and runs the International Consumer Electronics Show, announced today that the Dish Hopper with Sling HD DVR is joining the Razer Edge gaming tablet as a co-winner of the 2013 Best of Show in the CES awards program. The CEA also designated the Dish Hopper a 2013 Design and Engineering Award Honoree at CES.

CNET, which produced the Best of Show awards program under contract with the CEA, originally voted the Dish Hopper with Sling as the winner. The Dish Hopper product was taken out of the … Read more

Some Facebook users can now go beyond simply updating their status -- they can put an emoticon on the moment.

Facebook last night rolled out what it's calling "a really small test" across its Web site and mobile app that lets users pick from an array of emoticons -- smiley faces and other little bits of graphic art that have now been around for some 30 years -- to express how they're feeling at any given moment.

TechCrunch was first to report on the feature.

Facebook provided CNET with screenshots of the emoticon feature in action. … Read more

Facebook shares are down today, spelling some possible erosion in the stock price heading into the rest of the week of trading.

Shares in the big social network are down 3.5 percent today to $30.13 in early trading. The company's stock ended the day yesterday at $31.24, up significantly from the company's 52-week low of $17.55. That rally has been due to Facebook's ability to gain traction in mobile and reassure investors that it could continue to grow.

The company went a long way in making its case yesterday, reporting better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings. … Read more

Want to know where to get the best Tex-Mex in Austin? Or how about the locals' favorite bookstore in San Francisco? Well, Foursquare will let you know what it thinks.

The check-in social network rolled out its "best of" guide today based on more than 3 billion member check-ins and tens of millions of user tips, likes, and dislikes. The guide shows the top places users checked into in 2012 in 30 cities across the U.S., such as New York, Atlanta, and Honolulu.

"There are plenty of lists of great places out there -- some are … Read more

In the networking device category, CNET conducts performance tests only on Wi-Fi routers and power-line adapters. Simply put, these are the two types of devices for which it is easy to measure data rates in repeatable and meaningful ways. For more information on other aspects of home networking devices, check out this series on their basics.

A router is the central gateway of a home network. Not only does it connect all devices together via network cables or Wi-Fi signals to form a network, but also it connects to the Internet via its WAN port, and it shares that connection … Read more

The pope has friended the online social networks in a big way.

Pope Benedict XIV, who only recently joined Twitter himself, is calling on his followers to use social-networking sites such as Facebook, Tumblr, and Pinterest to spread their faith to nonbelievers.

"The challenge facing social networks is how to be truly inclusive: thus they will benefit from the full participation of believers who desire to share the message of Jesus and the values of human dignity which his teaching promotes," the pontiff said in a message delivered on the 47th World Communications Day. "Believers are increasingly … Read more

WASHINGTON, D.C.--At this week's State of the Net conference, an annual event of the bipartisan Congressional Internet Caucus, members of Congress, staffers, and technology policy junkies gathered once again to explore the government's Internet-related priorities for the new year.

A few themes emerged, including possible legislation over cybersecurity, a rewrite of the 1996 Communications Act, reforming federal electronic-surveillance laws, and the continuing threat of both national governments and the United Nations trying to wrest control of Internet governance from engineering-driven groups.

The general consensus, however, was that for at least the next several months, the fiscal … Read more